Naru Naruto - to become a Fishcake!
by blessbunny
Summary: Insert description here: [Naruto is a girl, she has a crush on Neji, Hinata doesn't like the sexy jutsu, Sakura stops being a wimp and Kakashi is still a lazy bastard. My penchants for somewhat... 'original' pairings may show up in later chapters and there's humour. Let's hope it's actually funny. A teamwork focused, Team 7 centric fic! (With side characters that do stuff)]
1. Chapter 1

CHAPTER ONE: She was hiding the secret badass in the big jacket.

* * *

**A/N: This could be the start of something new… like a rivalry! Don't read this chapter if you're a pacifist!**

**A/N: In advance I will say this once and only once: I do not own Naruto, or anything related to Naruto, its spin offs and other official merchandise. This is a non-profit endeavour. Don't sue me for not wasting screen space with this disclaimer in further chapters.**

**A/N: Thoughts – italicised and single quoted**

**Dialogue – double quoted**

**Emphasis in dialogue – single quotes or italics or both for extra flavour!**

**Inner Sakura – single quotes, italics and underlined.**

**A/N: The Shinobi Dictionary at the bottom of every chapter will explain original concepts, techniques and some semi-canon ones you might not be familiar with. (Like from the video games and movies and filler and stuff - that's what I'm referring to by semi-canon) Mostly though, I just spam the section with horrible jokes. Approach with caution.**

**A/N: For the most part I'll be following a regular schedule, updating weekly.**

**A/N: Please review and fill the review hole in my heart.**

**A/N: At the bottom of this chapter you will find a Conversation note – C/N. These will be popping up infrequently but you should check them out – They'll be clearing things up and explaining plot progression points sometimes… For example: shipping. If you're into romance and pairings you should read this one at least. **

* * *

"Naruto-chan, over here?" Hinata asked.

"A little to the left... And lather it on a little thicker," Naruto instructed.

Iruka stood watching them clean the Hokage monument with a bemused expression. "Naruto, why is Hinata helping you scrub the Hokage monument?" he asked.

"Actually, we're not scrubbing, we're giving it a sponge bath!" Naruto explained.

"But... We have people for that. With a schedule. Why are you...?" Iruka trailed off. The other chuunin gathered behind Iruka looked at him nonplussed.

"So we heard Naruto was playing a prank..." one of them remarked.

"But she's just cleaning the Hokage monument. With bubble bath apparently." another one continued.

"Okay I'm confused. Naruto why are you cleaning the Hokage monument with bubble bath?" Iruka yelled up at her questioningly.

"Okay, Hinata-chan take over for me," Naruto ordered. Hinata nodded and returned to scrubbing the second Hokages' nose.

Naruto jumped down to greet the assembled chuunin and the Hokage who had come to gawk. "Hiii, Old man! Iruka-sensei!" she greeted.

Iruka sighed. "Naruto, show some respect."

"It's okay Iruka," the Hokage chuckled. "Hello Naruto. Why are you giving my venerated ancestors a bubble bath again?"

Naruto plopped down on the floor and put on a thoughtful expression. "Originally, I wanted to put makeup on the Hokage faces up here. Then I realised how much that would cost - to buy enough foundation and lipstick and eyeshadow... Yikes! So I was going to graffiti up the monument instead when I remembered what Hinata-chan told me!"

And here she trailed off apparently recalling whatever it was Hinata had told her.

"And that is...?" Iruka prompted.

Naruto's eyes snapped wide open. "Right! She told me to stop doing juvenile things and that I was going to graduate soon so I had to act like an adult! So I decided that instead I would give the Hokage faces all a nice good clean and impress everyone! Consider = My thoughtfulness is a sign of my new maturity! Maturity befitting of a Hokage!"

Iruka cracked a smile. So that was what she was doing. "Nice try," he said, ruffling her hair, "but have you ever heard of a twelve year old Hokage?"

The other assembled chuunins started to laugh. The Hokage too indulged in a good hearty chuckle. "I'll put you on my list of potential heirs," he promised Naruto. "And your friend too who is also diligently scrubbing away."

"What? Hinata-chan doesn't want to be a Hokage she wants to get married and have lots of babies," Naruto stared at the Hokage in confusion.

At this Iruka let out a snort. "Ah, I'll take that into consideration," The Hokage promised. "Then, since there appears to be no need to stop Naruto and Hinata from what they are doing, if everyone could..." he trailed off. The chuunin immediately dispersed, though some of them hung around a while back to watch the rare sight of Naruto and Hinata giving the Hokage monument a bubble bath.

"Are you sure you don't want to stop them?" Iruka asked, watching his blonde student rapidly ascend the cliff face and get back to work.

"Not at all. This will save us maintenance money," The Hokage smiled. "A prank like this is actually quite refreshing, don't you think, Iruka?"

* * *

And then Naruto found herself sneaking into the Hokage Tower in the middle of the night. How the hell had this happened anyway?

'_If it wasn't for Mizuki-sensei my awesome ninja life would be over!'_ Naruto shivered in horror. Thank god Mizuki-sensei had come through for her.

Well… Somehow she managed to make her way to the scroll without encountering anyone until she ran straight into the Third Hokages' very surprised chest.

_'Ah shit...'_ "Sexy Trauma Jutsu!" she half whispered, half shouted. The Hokage collapsed to the floor, eyes rolling back in his head and Naruto felt a little guilty. That was a jutsu she had never imagined using on another Leaf Shinobi... she just hoped the old man would shrug it off.

_'Ehehehe... maybe this was a bad idea? But I do have to graduate after all...'_ she resolved to send the Hokage a letter of apology and some expensive chocolates.

"Sorry, old man," she hastily apologised as she fled the tower and headed to the clearing that Mizuki-sensei had told her about, the one he had assured her would be deserted. Setting the surprisingly large scroll on her lap she carefully unrolled it. "So, I just have to learn one of these..."

She decided to learn two instead. "Maybe if I learn two techniques, Iruka-sensei will be so impressed he'll pass me twice and I'll get two hitaites! Then I can wear one on my arm and one on my forehead!" Naruto shivered at the thought of how awesomely cool that sounded. Definitely befitting of a Hokage.

"So chakra pulse and shadow clone! I'll learn the pulse first then, it looks pretty easy. And the clones are... well, clones. Not easy." She decided to learn the first two techniques on the scroll instead of wasting time and reading the whole damn thing and then deciding. Iruka-sensei would have found her long before she ever got to the back of this hugeass scroll.

* * *

'_She better give me a damn good apology and a whole carton of chocolates – and not just any chocolates but the good stuff,_' the Hokage thought irritably. He loved Naruto, he really did, but that had been far from sporting.

He had sent out a whole team of chuunin to find her and was now watching events play out before him on his crystal ball. Iruka had already found her, luckily enough, but then so had that white haired upstart, Mizuki. Unfortunately he didn't have enough information to go there and punch Mizuki himself so he would have to rely on Iruka to do it for him. He had to sit here and see if any relevant information about Mizukis' possible motives for the theft came up from the chuunin he had sent investigating.

Iruka was more than a match for Mizuki anyway.

'_Shit!'_ the Hokage thought, eyes widening in shock.

Unless Naruto was involved, apparently.

The Hokage kept his eyes trained on his crystal ball impatiently. That damn Mizuki - impaling his favourite academy teacher like that. He just hoped Naruto got in a good punch on Irukas behalf. Or an exploding tag. That would work too.

* * *

Meanwhile, at the scene that the Hokage was currently watching:

"Iruka-sensei?!" Naruto looked up in shock at the man who had just saved her life.

"Naruto. I got here in time," Iruka smiled. He was so relieved.

Naruto's form started to tremble under him. "W-why? Why would you sacrifice yourself for me? Iruka-sensei!" In her panic she'd snapped and started yelling at him.

"Jeez, it's not like he's dead or anything," Mizuki rolled his eyes. "He's just got himself impaled on my Fuma Shuriken like a self-sacrificing idiot, that's all."

Privately, Iruka agreed. He probably could have handled the situation better but he had just been so worried... about Naruto. "Naruto. I'm sorry. I know what it's like, being by yourself all the time. I know how lonely it can be. Unlike you, I at least got some time with my family before I lost them but you... I should've been there for you!" Tears started dripping out of his eyes landing on Naruto's face who was beneath him. Tears started dripping out of Naruto's eyes too.

"I was just like you. Doing stupid things to get attention but Naruto, you're much stronger than I am. You've been improving lately, even without my help. I should've been there for you and I wasn't but all the same I'm proud of you Naruto!" Iruka choked out. It was true. He was proud of her.

"How... touching. Should I get out my eye drops?" Mizuki asked, rolling his eyes. "I can fake tears just as well as Iruka, you know? Should I cry for you, Naruto?" he asked.

Naruto gasped and the tears in her eyes gave way to a look of betrayal. "You're lying, Iruka-sensei? I thought you..." her voice cracked.

Iruka could feel his new hatred of Mizuki growing even more potent. "Of course I'm not, Naruto. I'm-"

"Yes, of course he's not. Why would he lie to the demon child? It's not like he hates her for being a demon or anything," Mizuki mocked.

"Demon child?" Naruto was gaping at Mizuki open mouthed. "You know why everyone calls me that!" She accused.

"What, did my tone give it away?" Mizuki asked dryly. "Of course I know you simpering twit, _everyone_ knows! Only the current generation of students – you included - don't know!"

"Mizuki," Iruka warned, "you wouldn't want to go breaking any laws now, would you?" he asked, deceptively sweetly.

"Actually, I do. I don't know why - I'm just really in the mood tonight! I fact I've already broken a few!" Mizuki crowed. "Naruto, there was a law made on the day you were born. ''Don't mention the fact that Naruto is the Kyuubi' is the law. 'Don't tell Naruto' is the unspoken most important part of the law. As if not knowing about the stupid law could actually change your nature! From the moment the fourth Hokage sealed the Kyubi into you, there has only been a monster in that body. The Kyuubi consumed the child years ago." He explained to her slowly.

"Naruto learnt about sealing in the academy! She already knows that sealed objects don't change the container. A scroll is a scroll. A scroll holding a kunai is still a scroll!" Iruka pointed out.

"What?!" Mizukis eyes opened comically wide. "I thought all she did in the academy was sleep! Are you sure she learnt that?" He moved his eyes to focus on Naruto's and his voice darkened, "Are you sure you're not a monster?" he asked her. "Did you know you even killed Irukas' parents on your first birthday? No wonder he hates you..."

"That's not true! Naruto you've heard stories about the strong and powerful demon fox. Do you really think the Kyuubi would fail his graduation test three times? Do you really think the Kyuubi wouldn't even be able to completely read Kanji after all these years? Do you really think that the Kyuubi would burn its' tongue scarfing down ramen as soon as it arrives every time without learning its' lesson like an idiot?" Iruka asked.

"Are you calling me an idiot?" Naruto asked, feeling hurt and angry.

"Yes! You're my idiot! You're Naruto the orange wearing, Hinata corrupting, ramen guzzling, class failing, Neji chasing idiot! You're my student - No, you're more than my student. Naruto... even someone as dense as you has to realise... I care about you. I won't let you pass a test if you're not ready because I don't want you getting hurt. Naruto I-"

"Would you cut with the crappy lies already?" Mizuki asked. "This is just boring - Naruto just give me the damn scroll and I won't kill you," he ordered.

Naruto looked up at her teacher in confusion. She wanted to trust him. He'd bought her ramen so many times and he'd saved her from Mizuki and he said he was proud of her. No one had ever said that before. But against her wishes, doubt was rearing its ugly head and poisoning her thoughts. She couldn't think clearly.

_'Please, I just need a sign,'_ she begged, hoping someone was listening.

The clearing was quiet as Mizuki waited for his answer save for Irukas heavy breathing and the rustle of trees in the wind. Blood from Irukas wound was slipping down and dripping off the sides of his chuunin vest.

_'Please,'_ she asked again.

Without warning Irukas blood that should have hit the floor was hit by a sudden gust of wind and blew into Naruto's eyes. That wasn't possible...

"Naruto! Have you made up your mind or not?!" Mizuki asked.

"Yes," Naruto stood up, hesitantly rubbing the blood out of her eyes. "Yes," she blinked, "I can see clearly now."

* * *

The Hokage looked in disbelief at the sight of Mizukis battered and burnt body passed out on the ground in his globe. "What an... inventive technique," he remarked.

That was even better than a punch!

He decided that Naruto's little show was amusing enough to let her somewhat off the hook regarding the technique she'd ambushed him with earlier.

* * *

Iruka walked up to Mizuki, who was still giving off smoke and stuck another explosive tag on him.

"Iruka-sensei?" Naruto asked.

"For luck," Iruka replied. "It won't kill him - unfortunately."

"Uh... Iruka-sensei?" Naruto asked.

"Yes?" Iruka replied.

"That stuff you said earlier. Did you mean it?" Naruto asked.

Iruka looked at her in surprise. "You're still doubting what I said? Of course I meant it! Naruto, I love you! I tried not to admit to myself, but..." he admitted.

Naruto's cheeks turned pink. "I love you too, Iruka-sensei," she reciprocated shyly. _'He's just like what I imagine a strict aunt would be like...'  
_  
Iruka flushed. Somehow it felt so embarrassing to admit that he loved her, that he saw her like a little sister. Well, talking about your feelings wasn't supposed to be very manly so maybe that was why?

Iruka walked up to Naruto, "Naruto, close your eyes," he ordered. Naruto flashed him a trusting smile and promptly closed her eyes. Iruka had to force himself not to take a moment to feel touched, instead tying his hitaite around her head.

"Congratulations on graduating, Naruto," he said.

Naruto opened her eyes and reached her hands up to feel for the hitaite. 'Wow!' She smiled cheesily. Maybe she didn't need two Hitiates after all. Having Iruka-senseis' was more than enough.

* * *

"And that's what happened after we split for the day," Naruto told Hinata with a blush on her face.

"You're terrible at narrating, Naruto-chan," Hinata told her frankly.

"What? Why?! I thought it was all really touching!" Naruto protested.

"Yeah, just maybe a little bit too touching. I felt like someone was reading me a romance novel." Hinata explained.

Naruto's face turned completely red. "Did it really sound like that?" she asked, burying her face in her hands.

"Truthfully, yes." Hinata answered.

"This is so mortifying. Please just kill me and get it over with or I might just die of embarrassment!" Naruto begged.

Hinata giggled. "I'm just teasing you, Naruto-chan! But really, you couldn't tell that Iruka-sensei loved you? He was always buying you ramen and everything!"

Naruto flushed. "You're mean, Hinata-chan. And I couldn't tell. It had never crossed my mind that anyone might love me."

"Oh Naruto," Hinata smiled at her sadly, "I love you."

"But that's obvious!" Naruto grinned, "you say that all the time!"

"Well, the Hokage loves you. And Teuchi and Ayame at Ichiraku's sure do! They're always asking me how you're doing whenever I go there without you," Hinata said.

Naruto looked at her disbelievingly. "Nah, no way. They just think I'm funny, that's all," but contrary to her words a pleased and embarrassed flush was making its way up her neck.

Hinata smiled at her. "You know they do. And you love them too. There are plenty of people that love you, Naruto-chan."

"Not Neji!" Naruto countered with a mischievous smile.

"Not yet." Hinata smirked.

"Not yet!" Naruto agreed with another sneaky smile and an enthusiastic high five.

* * *

Naruto marched straight up to the trash can and pulled out the boy who was following her by his tufts of hair hanging over the top. She recognised him – he was the same boy who had tripped over his scarf in the Hokages' office while she was handing in her registration papers. "It's not a very good disguise when I can see your scarf trailing behind you and your hair pokes out the top," she told him.

The kid blinked at her in surprise. "Oh. ...I mean, Impressive! You found me!"

Naruto gave him an unimpressed look. "You can stop trying to look cool now. There's no one here for you to impress anyway," she said.

The kid pouted at her, trying to pretend he wasn't blushing. "There's you. You don't have much tact, do you?"

"What's a tact? Some kind of glue?" Naruto asked.

A small sweat drop materialised on the kids head. "Nevermind that. I wanted to ask you to teach me the technique you defeated gramps with. The tower officials told me about it."

Naruto snorted. "Kid, you couldn't pay me to teach that technique to you. I'd be paying for your therapy for years." She started to walk off.

The kid ran up behind her and grabbed the sleeve of her track suit top. "Then, teach me something else! I want to be strong like you!" He pleaded.

"I know! You want to be strong to get all the ninja girls, right?" Naruto concluded. "Ah, man," she sighed, "you're a typical guy."

"No!" The kid blushed. "You're a pervert!"

"I am not a pervert! I hate perverts! In certain circles I'm even known as _'Naruto the pervert buster'_!" Naruto complained.

"Wooooow!" The kid stared up at her with stars in his eyes. "So will you teach me a technique?" The kid asked hopefully.

"Sure! Actually I was going to teach you anyway because you're cute and I like cute things," Naruto shrugged. "You know moe, right? I've actually got a bit of a weakness for it," she confessed.

"I'm not cute, I'm cool and handsome!" The kid protested.

Naruto giggled at his words. "No, you're totally cute. You've still got baby teeth, your scarf is too big for you and you're so tiny!" She exclaimed, holding together her thumb and index finger to show the kid how 'tiny' he was.

"Are you done making fun of me?" The kid asked, looking anything but flattered.

"Yep, let's go!" Naruto grabbed his hand and started dragging him away. The kid couldn't help but wonder if it wasn't too late to ask someone else for techniques, someone who maybe didn't wear an all-orange ensemble.

* * *

"Sooo... This technique I've just taught you may seem simple but don't be deceived! This technique is my foundation for my most powerful techniques! Remember to be inventive and don't just stick to making sexy girls all the time!" Naruto lectured.

The kid transformed out of the buxom brunette he had invented and stared at Naruto with stars in his eyes. "Really? Really, really?"

"Yes!" Naruto laughed.

"Show me one, show me one!" the kid pleaded.

"Okay then... Sexy Jutsu YOUR TYPE!" Naruto formed the ram seal and was enveloped in a cloud of smoke. When the smoke cleared, a diminutive girl with gleaming black hair and green eyes about Konohamarus age stood in front of him in a tasteful white and red kimono.

The kid blushed. "Wow, incredible boss! How did you know I liked traditional girls?" he asked.

"I was paying careful attention. I can discern the types of most people from the way they act - Well, you get embarrassed really easily and you're pretty innocent for a boy your age so I made an educated guess." Naruto explained. "The sexy jutsu YOUR TYPE is harder to pull off, but it's way more effective and it doesn't just rely on sex appeal in every case."

The kid quickly pulled out a notepad from his trouser pocket and furiously started writing down everything she was saying. "Can I try it out on you?" he asked after he'd finished writing everything down.

"Go ahead," Naruto smiled. _'Well, unless he transforms exactly into Neji it's not going to work.'_ She thought wryly.

"Sexy Jutsu YOUR TYPE!" The kid was enveloped with smoke and when it cleared away Naruto was greeted with the sight of a guy with dark hair in small braids all hanging down and orange pants. He was topless and he had a dragon tattoo winding around his torso. "Hey gorgeous," he winked.

Naruto burst into laughter. "Nice try, kid." She walked up to his transformation and scrutinised it, walking around to examine it from all angles. "Interesting choice though. Going for bad boy appeal with a gangster? That might be a good technique actually - bad boy sexy jutsu. Keep it in mind," she critiqued.

"Right," the kid nodded and proofed back into himself. "But why didn't it work? I was so sure you liked the confident type..."

"Rookie mistake," Naruto explained. "The 'all girls want bad boys' is a common assumption. I like quiet, dignified guys actually. Though good job on the long dark hair - I do tend to like guys with longer hair," she admitted. _'Well, actually, one quiet and dignified guy with long dark hair. But there's no point in telling the kid that,' _she thought.

"So I was partially right!" the kid cheered.

"Yeah, pretty good for a new user actually," Naruto praised him.

"Show me another, boss!" the kid pleaded.

"Alright," Naruto laughed, "I'll show you the version you_ MUST_ use if any kids are nearby, no exceptions. Sexy Jutsu Kid Safe Version!"

"You're just wearing a one piece. That's not a very inventive technique," The kid pouted.

"This is an important one, though! If you don't want to be bashed up by nearby girls, when kids are around use this version," Naruto explained.

The kid whipped out his notepad and quickly added to his notes.

Then Naruto sat down cross-legged on the floor. She was getting hungry - It was just about time to take a break. _'So why are you trying to bash up your grandad anyway?'_ she asked, withdrawing a bento. There was no time for ramen so it would have to do.

"Right. Yeah I should have introduced myself earlier, but my name is Konohamaru," the kid - no, Konohamaru replied.

"Ah, right you're named after the village," Naruto observed. "Hello Konohamaru. Nice to meet you, I'm Naruto," she said, grabbing his hand and shaking it.

"Nice to meet you, Naruto," the kid replied. "So my grandfather is completely devoted to this village - you can even see that by the name he got to pick for me. And the village loves my Grandfather too so by proxy they also love me. Even though I haven't done anything - they just love me for the sake of it. I want to prove I've earned that treatment by defeating Gramps and becoming Hokage!" Konohamaru explained.

"That's not a bad goal but you're kinda going about it the wrong way. Defeating your grandfather isn't going to make you Hokage, you know," Naruto started explaining.

At that point a strange man in dark clothes and glasses appeared in the clearing taking them both by surprise.

Naruto looked at him in surprise. "You're that weird guy from the Hokage office!" she realised.

Ebisu ignored her, grabbed Konohamarus arm and started to walk off.

"Get off me! I'm going to stay here and learn how to become a strong Hokage!" Konohamaru protested.

"To be a Hokage you have to be an outstanding shinobi in all disciplines! You must master over 1000 jutsu!" Ebisu replied.

_'Yeah, like since when?'_ Naruto snorted. _'That makes no sense at all.'_

"Sexy Jutsu YOUR TYPE!" Konohamaru yelled.

Naruto looked at Ebisu with amusement. "You have a thing for gingers?" she asked.

Ebisu blushed and looked away from the slightly chubby ginger in BDSM gear.

"Nice job picking up on his masochistic tendencies," Naruto complemented Konohamaru.

The ginger haired woman puffed out her ample chest, covered only by the stripperific leather string thing she was wearing. "Thanks boss!"

"I don't find that attractive at all," Ebisu lied. "This is stupid and... and vulgar! This won't help you become the Hokage at all. If you stay here you will only become as stupid and vulgar as her!" he declared, sneering at Naruto.

"I am not vulgar, I am pure and clean!" yelled Naruto.

"Uh boss... you did just teach me how to transform into a hot naked chick," Konohamaru reminded her.

"Well," Naruto huffed, "at the very least I'm more pure and clean than him," she said, giving Ebisu a dirty look.

"And I can prove it! Sexy Me Oh My Jutsu!"

Now Ebisu was confronted with a woman whose large breasts were barely contained by her top - the exact same top Ebisu was wearing as a matter of fact. Her pants - the exact same pants Ebisu was wearing as a matter of fact, were slightly too large for her and had slipped down to her hips revealing the top of a pink G-string. Her eyes were hidden behind dark glasses but her soft pink lips glistened invitingly. And she was marching across the clearing towards Ebisu, standing so close to him - way too close for comfort.

The brunette Ebisu girl clone tugged at her collar. "Hey, wanna see if my underwear is a matching set?" she grinned, tugging her top further down.

The blush that had already been on Ebisus' face intensified, bypassing the colours red and purple entirely and taking on a sickly bluish-black colour. Naruto and Konohamaru could practically hear his heartbeat and steam was coming out of his ears. He tried to sneer at Naruto but the blood gushing out of his nose was ruining the effect. The blood flow was thickening; it was practically a torrent and then without warning blood spurted out so fiercely that Ebisu was sent flying across the clearing.

"Oh shit!" Naruto hurriedly ran over and checked him for a pulse. Turning around she gave Konohamaru a v sign for victory. "He's okay!" she yelled. "But he might need a blood transfusion!"

Konohamaru stared in disbelief. He couldn't believe the devastation that had been wreaked on his teachers' body and all with Naruto not even holding a kunai. Such a simple technique really was effective.

"Wow boss. Total overkill," he gasped.

Naruto flushed. "Yes... maybe I should have used a different technique. That one does seem to cause a few mental issues sometimes. Still, I beat him!"

"Yeah, you beat him! You're awesome, boss!" Konohamaru cheered.

"Right, so what I was saying before he interrupted us was that you need to focus on getting stronger and becoming a dependable ninja. There are many people who want to be the Hokage so you have to prove that you're better than them and beating an old man isn't going to do that. I mean look at me - I'm still just a graduate, y'know?" Naruto said.

"So then you're saying that I can't slack off, right?" Konohamaru asked.

"Exactly!" Naruto beamed at him. "Listen to the closet pervert over there, he might be a stupid pervert but he's honestly trying to help you become stronger. And even then you can't rest easy because my dream is to be the Hokage! You'll have to beat me first!" she teased, sticking her tongue out at him.

"I don't know if I can..." Konohamaru muttered, glancing at the pale body of his teacher. "But I'll get stronger and surpass you, I just know it! Now we're rivals!"

"Yeah, you got it!" Naruto grinned. "Now you go grab the closet pervs' legs, I'll get his arms and let's go drag him to the hospital before he dies of blood loss."

"It might be a good idea to send him a letter of apology and some chocolates - nice chocolates," Konohamaru advised.

"Yeah..." Naruto agreed with a sheepish smile on her face. _'I seem to be apologizing to a lot of people recently,' _she thought feeling somewhat ashamed. _'I hope they like Belgian chocolate...'_

* * *

"Are you serious?!"

Naruto shifted under the unusually harsh gaze of her friend. "Uh, yes? Have I ever lied to you?"

"You don't want me to answer that," Hinata sighed. "Naruto. I let the fact that you almost gave an old man a heart attack go because you were repentant but... you sent a guy to the hospital? For a blood transfusion? What is wrong with you?!"

"I was just trying to help out the kid," Naruto replied, nervously twiddling her thumbs.

"The kid that you taught how to be a sexual deviant? I thought you promised me you weren't going to use that technique anymore!" Hinata not quite but almost yelled.

"I didn't use it... I just taught him how to use it," Naruto objected. "And I made sure to teach him the kid-friendly version so he wouldn't get bashed by girls!"

"After you taught him the normal version... Naruto, he's a kid! If you had to teach him that technique you should have taught him the kid friendly version!" Hinata almost yelled at her again.

Naruto buried her head in her hands and whimpered. "You're scary, Hinata-chan," she whispered.

Hinata sighed in exasperation and then noticed to her mortification that there were several café-goers eavesdropping on them. Hunching into herself, she shrunk down in her seat and waited for them to stop staring.

When they finally stopped she looked at Naruto again who was still making piteous whimpering noises. "I'm not angry with you, Naruto-chan," she sighed. "Just a little disappointed and hurt."

To her horror Naruto looked at her with waterfalls pouring out of her eyes. "That's even worse!" She wailed.

Hinatas self-preservation instincts - the ones that made her shy away from tears - kicked in. "Naruto-chan, calm down!" she started thumping the crying girls back, trying to get her to quieten. "Just do better next time! You can do that, right?"

In an instant Naruto's tears dried up and a sunny smile materialised on her face. "Yeah! I won't let you down again, Hinata-chan!" she beamed.

Hinata felt a sweat drop materialise on her pale face. _'Somehow I doubt that, Naruto-chan.'_

* * *

Somehow Naruto ended up sitting next to Sasuke instead of Hinata-chan. Just like how she'd somehow ended up sitting next to him every day. _'Not again!'_ Naruto groaned to herself. The back seats always went first and Naruto never arrived early enough. Even though she and Hinata-chan had arrived at the same time today, only Hinata-chan managed to snag a seat. _'This sucks...'_

"Hey, can you let me through?" a somewhat high pitched voice interrupted her thoughts.

Naruto barely registered it, face screwed up in concentration, trying to figure out why she always ended up stuck in this seat. And then she would have to sit next to Ino or Sakura or some other fangirl as well... At least Sakura mostly stuck to staring at Sasuke after her initial fights with the other fangirls were over.

"Naruto, move your ass! I want to sit on the other side of you!", and then before Naruto could react she was pushed aside so the owner of the voice could sit where she wanted.

Naruto cracked open an eyelid in irritation. So today it was Sakura. Who had just slammed her into the desk with her skinny knees. _'Great way to greet your deskmate, Sakura-__chan__,'_ Naruto thought sarcastically. Normally she didn't have any problems with Sakura. A little loud and a little bossy. Audibly proud of getting the highest marks on the academy tests and rumoured to have something like a dietic memory. She didn't bother Naruto and that was the important thing, so Naruto ignored her for the most part.

Hinata on the other hand was not nearly as charitable. _'Pink haired ***...'_ she glared at Sakura. Discreetly of course, so she wouldn't catch any attention. Hinatas devotion to Naruto sometimes overruled the nicer and more merciful parts of her personality.

Naruto just stared at Sakura waiting to see if she would apologise but she appeared to be too preoccupied. With Sasuke.

_'What do they see in him again?'_ Naruto thought wearily.

She hopped up onto the table to see if she could figure it out. _'His hair is stupid. And he's glaring at me... very charming I'm sure… if you like that kind of thing.'_ It's not like he was bad looking but the hair and the attitude kind of cancelled it all out in Naruto's opinion. "Oh!" Naruto realised. "It must be the stoic thing. The whole too cool to smile thing..." she muttered to herself. Sasuke would make a good sexy jutsu base she realised. "Sexy Silent Jutsu? Well he's a silent kinda guy so..."

Sasuke glared at Naruto who appeared to be glaring at him - in reality, she just had a habit of narrowing her eyes while thinking. He didn't know why she was glaring at him, but he wasn't just going to sit back and let her do it. So he glared back at her. But it was getting kind of boring... And... She had very bright hair actually. Very startling blonde hair and blue eyes. Sasuke's inner hair stylist perked up_. 'Could it be possible that she knows any clan techniques?'_ He wondered. Good haircare was a bit of a status thing for certain clans - and Naruto had very peculiar hair for Konoha.

He had actually wondered about it before - she didn't exactly look like the Yamanakas did - Was she maybe from another country? Naruto was an orphan though so he couldn't be sure but it was possible that she was actually descended from an important clan. "Hey Naruto, about your hair-"

Sakura looked in horror at her two classmates. Why were they sitting so close together? Why were they staring soulfully into each other's eyes like that? Why were they both whispering to each other in hushed tones IN FRONT OF THE WHOLE CLASS? All these questions and more were never answered because... before she could drag Naruto away, an excited graduate elbowed her in the back of the head and she fell forward to meet the lips of a startled Uchiha heir.

Sakura froze.  
_  
'Bad timing to have both their mouths open,' _ Sakura thought in mute horror.  
_  
'Right. That is not the issue here.'_ Inner Sakura retorted.

_'No really. There could have been tongue in that exchange,'_ Sakura numbly replied.

Inner Sakura finally caught on. _'SHA FUCKING NO! NO NO NO SASUKE NO!'_

Naruto and Sasuke appeared much less affected by this event and merely nonchalantly pulled away from each other.

"Sorry Sasuke. I was just trying to scrutinise you, not steal a kiss from you," Naruto apologised.

"Don't worry about it, it was just an accident," Sasuke shrugged.

"No, really, I feel bad. Let me buy you a bowl of ramen?" Naruto asked.

_'That sounds like a date!'_ Inner Sakura raged.

"Will it have tomatoes in it?" Sasuke asked.

Naruto awkwardly scratched the back of her head. "Not usually. Want a salad instead?"

"That will do," Sasuke agreed. "And... I have to know. Is your hair natural? Do you use any products or jutsu to make it look like that? The colour too - is that real?"

Naruto blinked at him in surprise. "Sasuke, It's hard enough pulling a brush through this and you think I'd try to waste hours trying to style it on my own?!" she asked, pointing to her hair.

Sasuke blinked owlishly back at her. "You need help. I must help you - that is just a waste of perfectly good hair." _'And my mother would disown me if she knew Naruto barely brushes her hair and I didn't teach her better.'_ he thought to himself.

_'That harpy is seducing Sasuke-kun!'_ all the fangirls thought and simultaneously glared at Naruto.

_'That harpy is seducing Naruto-chan!'_ Hinata thought, glaring daggers at Sasuke.

Naruto and Sasuke were pulled out of their conversation by the massive amounts of killing intent directed towards them. They both looked at each other.

"There is only one solution," proposed Sasuke.

Naruto nodded.

"Running away!" They both said and immediately tried to run away only to find the exits blocked by fuming fangirls... and a fuming Hinata.

Kiba shook his head in disgust. "Aren't you all over-reacting?" he asked.

"I know right. Seriously, stuff like this happens all the time," Sasuke rolled his eyes. "Just the 42nd kiss... at least it wasn't a civilian this time. "

"Um... Sasuke, I think that's just you," Naruto whispered. "You should probably get a chastity belt for your lips or something."

"Okay that's devastating and all-," she paused to cry about the fact that Sasuke had been kissed 42 times and then resumed speaking – "but uh… Naruto, Sasuke's one thing... but wasn't that your first kiss?" One of the fangirls reminded her.

Naruto's heart stopped. Her pupils dilated. Moisture mysteriously appeared on her cheeks. "NO, I'M RUINED FOR NEJI!" she shrieked. "I'M NO LONGER PURE!"

If anything, Hinatas glare intensified.

"So... You're not in love?" Ino asked dubiously.

"No." Sasuke said, feeling strangely scared for his life.

* * *

When Iruka entered the classroom he was shocked to see Naruto - who he would have expected to be ecstatic at graduating- with miniature waterfalls gushing out of her eyes. Could Naruto be being bullied?! Irukas' eyes narrowed as he scanned the classroom. Now that he wasn't distracted he noticed a large group of girls supplying Naruto with tissues and consoling her.

...He decided it was better not to ask.

"EVERYONE SHUT UP!" Iruka greeted the class in his customary fashion, while employing his big-head jutsu to get them back in order. "Even though you have all graduated you are still only Genin. This is the first step of your journey. Today you will be meeting your future sensei and forming three man teams with your classmates. Naruto couldn't care less and started examining her fingernails instead. Hinata had already explained to her that seeing as Naruto's marks were way below hers they probably wouldn't be on the same team.

On the other hand... "SASUKE SASUKE SASUKE", Inner Sakura was so concentrated on her chant she was saying it out loud without realising and without regular Sakuras permission. Luckily for her Sasuke was trying to think of hair care products to recommend to Naruto and didn't notice.

Iruka looked at them and sweatdropped. "Well, this will be an interesting team", he thought to himself. "Next, team seven. Naruto Uzumaki, Sakura Haruno and Sasuke Uchiha".

Sakura couldn't contain her happiness at this and punched the air. Sasuke and Naruto both glared at each other at the same time. And then they both turned their faces away from each other and smirked. This was going to be the best rivalry ever.

Then it was lunch. Hinata walked up to Naruto to give her some last minute advice before leaving with her own teammates. "Naruto," she said, grabbing her by the shoulders, "even though I now hate both your teammates you need to get along with them. Or you could die. I don't want you to die and you don't want to die and Neji does not want to become a necrophiliac. Please try and get along with them for my sake, okay?" Hinata asked.

Naruto blinked. "Uh, sure?" She replied unsurely. Satisfied with her answer, Hinata demurely shuffled out of the classroom, following her teammates.

Naruto thought about her teammates and how to approach them. "Well, Sasuke and I are rivals now - after the whole kiss thing. So we hate each other but we don't want to kill each other or anything... we should be fine. Sasuke is... uh well I think he mostly just ignores Sakura but he might be slightly scared of her. And Sakura needs to tone the scariness down. So I should talk to her and make her less scary!" Naruto decided.

With that decided Naruto walked right up to Sakura and smiled brightly at her.

Sakura had mostly gotten over the whole kissing debacle thing by then so she just smiled kindly at Naruto. "Do you need more tissues?" she asked, holding up a pack of tissues. "Or a mascara touch up? Crying can be hard on a girl."

Naruto stared at her blankly. "What's mascara?"

Sakura looked at her in horror. "You need help." Against her will, Naruto found herself dragged off to the bathroom with her eyelids pried open and a thick black gooey substance applied to her eyelashes. Naruto tried to shake her off but Sakura was determined to stick the goop on her face so in the end Naruto gave up and let her. When she was finally done, Sakura brought Naruto in front of the mirror to proudly show off her work. Naruto couldn't see any difference at all.

"Uh... I feel pretty. And... I feel pudgy."

Somehow Sakura managed to understand what she was trying to say. "You mean pigmented, don't you? Because the mascara is black?"

Naruto's eyes snapped wide open. "Wow, yeah! You're so smart, Sakura!" Naruto stared right in Sakura's eyes feeling totally confused. "Sakura I'm staring into your eyes because I am totally confused," she told Sakura who had been starting to nervously back away.

Sakura stopped nervously backing away. "Is it the mascara?" she asked.

"No, it's you," Naruto explained. "You slammed me into a desk today. I don't get why you're being nice to me now. Uh... I don't get it. Yeah, if you could... please explain," Naruto gestured vaguely.

Sakura flushed and looked away. "I just get excited when Sasuke-kuns' around. I didn't mean to do that... Um, did I hurt you at all?" she asked.

Naruto gaped at her. _'That wasn't on purpose?'_ " Uh... no, it didn't hurt," Then something occurred to Naruto. "Uh.. wait. I kissed your precious Sasuke-kun" - she had to pause and wipe a few tears out of her eyes at this - "so shouldn't you hate me?"

Sakuras eyebrows furrowed and she turned her face away in thought.  
_  
'Well, it was an accident.'_ Sakura reasoned.

_'So we should forgive her?'_ Inner Sakura asked.  
_  
'Well, that was her first kiss. I feel sorry for her, I'll admit it,_' Sakura thought.  
_  
'Okay then, we forgive her. Unless... there was tongue involved.'_ Inner Sakura stipulated.

_'Fair enough,'_ Sakura agreed.

"Was there tongue involved?" she asked Naruto.

"Lord no," Naruto made a face.

"Okay, I forgive you," Sakura said.

"That's very generous of you." Naruto replied, surprised.

"Well, you did just lose your first kiss and I guess we are kind of teammates now. …Do you want to go outside and eat lunch together?" Sakura asked.

Naruto beamed at her. "Sure!" she chirped_. 'I didn't even have to bribe her to get her to talk to me...'_ she realised.

* * *

As soon as they had reached a random bench outside and sat down to eat Sakura started asking Naruto for dating advice. This was what Naruto had been trying to lead up to in the first place so she was very pleased at this turn of events.

"So I was just wondering if you had any idea what kind of girl Sasuke-kun likes," Sakura asked. "Some of the other girls spread false information around to sabotage each other but I know you wouldn't do that, Naruto, since you like Neji. I've tried different approaches on him - acting cute, acting sultry, and playing hard to get... I'm fresh out of ideas." she admitted.

"I am so glad you came to me for help with this!" Naruto beamed.

_'I'm actually kind of disappointed in myself,'_ Sakura thought. "Why is that?" she asked out loud.

"Because I am really good at telling peoples' types! I've learnt how to pick up on things like that as part of my research for my Sexy Jutsu techniques!" Naruto grinned proudly.

Against her better judgement Sakura began to feel hopeful. "So what's Sasuke-kuns' type?" She all but begged.

"He doesn't have one," Naruto shrugged.

"What?"

"He doesn't have one," Naruto repeated.

"Is that just a nice way of saying he's gay or something?" Sakura asked.

_'Not that I would really mind that,'_ Inner Sakura purred.

_'You shut up. This is important,'_ Sakura told her.

"Nope. I have no idea if he's gay or straight," Naruto admitted. "You'll have to wait a few years for his hormones to kick in - he's a bit of a late bloomer. Right now he's incapable of being attracted to anyone," she explained.  
_  
'That explains his reaction to the kiss earlier,'_ Sakura realised. "So then, what do I do?" She asked Naruto, feeling a little lost.

"You'll have to impress him in a way that doesn't rely on your sex appeal." Naruto replied.

Sakura thought about that. She hadn't ever really tried that before but the truth was... apart from her test marks she wasn't very impressive. And Sasuke-kun didn't care about her test marks anyway - if he did he would've showed interest in them some time.

"There's nothing very impressive about me, though," she admitted.

Naruto shook her head at her sadly. "Sakura, you have to have the right attitude for a start! Besides that's not even true - You get the highest test marks every time, you have a dietic memory - I think it's called, you learn Justu and other techniques right off the bat and you have pink hair!"

"Do you really think so?" Sakura asked shyly. "Oh and by the way, it's eidetic not dietic."

"Duh. And you hold back when I spar with you," Naruto nodded. "You start off at full strength and then you go easy on me. Every time! I'm not that weak..." she pouted, looking a bit hurt.

"Well, I'm not trying to go easy on you..." Sakura replied. "I'm just on a diet and it's been making me feel a little lethargic lately," she reluctantly admitted.

"Lethargic? Diet? Do you mean that your dietic memory makes things...? Okay no, you lost me," Naruto whimpered, clutching at her head.

"What I'm saying is I get tired easily when I spar or run fast or do things like that." Sakura explained.

"Why?"

"Because my diet is affecting my stamina probably." Sakura explained. _'Maybe dieting wasn't such a good idea after all...' _she thought to herself.

"Diet? Dietic?" Naruto cocked her head to the side, still confused.

"You're stuck on that, aren't you?" Sakura sighed. "Not dietic, eidetic. Spelled e-i-d-e-t-i-c. It means that you remember everything you read perfectly. And you know what dieting is - changing what you eat to lose weight."

"Ah, right," Naruto nodded sagely, "having a dietic memory sure is awesome."

Sakura decided to give up on trying to fix Naruto's vocabulary. It was beyond help anyway.

"But don't diet, it's stupid. You're too skinny anyway, you have bony legs. Just eat what you want," Naruto said.

"But what if I get fat?" Sakura couldn't help but ask.

"If you get fat you aren't training enough," Naruto grinned. She boldly lifted up the hem of her track suit top. Her tanned stomach was completely flat. "Eat properly, train properly and then fight me without wimping out!" she advised.

"You want to fight me?" Sakura asked, surprised.

"Yes, duh. If you're that much stronger when you're not doing some stupid diet you should fight me. I bet even that bastard, Sasuke, would want to fight you." Naruto giggled at her little mental image of a strong Sakura punching Sasuke into a tree.

"But I don't want to hurt Sasuke-kun..." Sakura replied.

"Oh, come on. A friendly little spar never hurt anyone!" Naruto reassured her. "And Sasuke can take care of himself," Seeing the look on Sakura's face she hastily added, "Well, if you really don't want him to get hurt that badly you should become strong and protect him. And spar with him properly too, it'll help him protect himself. I bet he'll be so impressed he'll say, 'Ooooh, Sakura-chaaaan! Kiiiiiis meeee!" Naruto made a silly kissy face that Sakura couldn't help but giggle at.

"You know... Your advice sucks less than I thought it would," Sakura told Naruto.

Naruto made a thoughtful pose and screwed her face up thinking deeply. "Hmmm should I be flattered by that..?" she pondered aloud. Sakura couldn't help giggling again at how silly Naruto's' face looked like that.

"I think I'll try it. I'm in love with Sasuke-kun so it makes sense to protect him. I'd hate it if he was hurt - I think it would hurt me more than if I was the one being hurt!" Sakura declared.

Naruto smiled brightly at her. "That's wonderful, Sakura. I'm sure that even the stick up that bastard's ass could be removed by someone as pretty and smart as you," she praised. "Oooooh, Saaaakuraaaa! I'm falling in love with your forehead and the largish brain it contaiiiiins!" she exclaimed, swooning dramatically.

Sakura burst into laughter. "I hope he likes me for more than my forehead and brain at least!" she laughed.

"And yooooouur pink haaaair! How could I forgeeeet thhhhaaaat, Saaaakuraaa!" Naruto melodramatically unswooned and serenaded her, kneeling on one knee.

"That's so smooth! I only hope Sasuke could say something so sexy and romantic to me in real life!" Sakura gasped out, between huge bursts of laughter.

Naruto winked at her and waggled her eyebrows suggestively. "For you baby, I would even say the word dietic. I'd even say it twice!" she declared _very_ romantically in a _very_ poor imitation of Sasuke's voice.

Sakura's laughter intensified so much she actually fell off the bench.

"My sides, my sides!" she gasped. Naruto immediately moved to help her.

_'I hope I won't have to buy her Belgian chocolates too,'_ she thought worriedly.

* * *

"Sooooo... Why do you like Sasuke, again?" Naruto asked Sakura bluntly.

"Well, he's good looking and rich and he has status," Sakura answered.

Naruto rolled her eyes. "Sakura, I know we haven't really talked before today, but you don't talk about Sasuke like someone you just like for his looks and stuff. Why bother lying to me?"

Sakura flushed and looked away. "Because it's really embarrassing?" She asked rhetorically.

"Seriously, Sakura he has a major stick up his ass. Not prime dating material if you ask me," Naruto shrugged.

"Sasuke-kun does not have a stick up his ass!" Sakura yelled. Then she blushed and glanced around to see if anyone might have possibly heard her. "Sasuke-kun might push everyone away, but he's just misunderstood."

Naruto looked at her in horror.

"Don't look at me like that!" Sakura snapped. "I know it sounds cliché, but it's true. Sasuke-kun spends all his time alone, training. He needs to open up, to talk to someone. Maybe it's not my business but I worry about him. I... I know that I'm kind of nosy... I don't mean to pry but sometimes I annoy him. I just want to be there for him because... you can't help who you like and I know that he's not a bad person. If I could just make him laugh or smile... like he used to..." Her words died off into a whisper and she ducked her face, flaming red.

Naruto stared at her, eyes wide.

"Well, I'm not a moron," Sakura sighed. "I know he's not in love with me but I care about him so much... and I don't even know why. You see why I'm embarrassed, right?" Sakura suddenly flipped her tomato red face back up and squarely met Naruto's gaze.

Naruto solidly looked back at her though her face was also starting to redden. "Well, as much as I'd like to deny it I guess we do have some things in common. And yeah... I guess you can't really help who you fall in love with..." looking somewhat weary, Naruto disconsolately blew her bangs out of her face.

"Uh, Naruto-"

Before Sakura could say anything Naruto rudely interrupted her. "Can I call you Sakura-chan?" she asked, face somewhat red. There were no traces of tiredness or frustration in her face so Sakura chalked it up to a momentary lapse of vision.

Sakura smiled at her and was almost more surprised than Naruto when she heard herself say, "Yes, of course."

Naruto shyly grabbed her hand and shook it, looking somewhat unsure_. 'She didn't expect me to say yes, did she?' _Sakura realised. Come to think of it Naruto only really hung around Hinata. She probably wasn't used to making friends or hanging out with other people.

* * *

Naruto clone looked at Sasuke. "I told you she wasn't that bad," she pointed out.

"Yeah, all right," Sasuke acquiesced. "You weren't completely off about her. Or the working as a team thing," he admitted.

"Are you going to give her a chance?" Naruto clone asked. She was somewhat more invested in the answer to the question than she thought she would be.

"...Yes. But if she goes back to her fangirl tendencies, no promises," Sasuke replied.

"Okay. And... this should be obvious, but don't tell her. That we eavesdropped," The clone requested, looking slightly sheepish.

Sasuke scoffed. "You're not the boss of me."

* * *

Naruto flew to her feet in alarm as Sasuke approached the both of them.

"I was eavesdropping," Sasuke admitted.

Naruto gaped at him. Was he going to give her away just like that?

"How much did you hear?" Sakura asked, throat suddenly dry and voice croaking audibly.

Sasuke gave her a funny look. "The part about you being in love with me, of course."

Sakura nodded and hung her head waiting to be told about how foolish her interest in him was or that she didn't understand him or something similar.

Sasuke said no such thing. Instead he merely turned to Naruto and said, "I'd like that salad now," Naruto cautiously nodded, turning back to Sakura and sending her an apologetic smile.

Sakura looked down but she wasn't surprised. She hadn't exactly expected Sasuke-kun or Naruto to accept her as their teammate with open arms.

Ten paces away, Sasuke turned back looking irritated. "Sakura, aren't you coming?" he asked, the irritation in his voice making it clear that only one answer was acceptable.

Sakura's heart started beating double time. "Sasuke-kun, wha-?" She could barely get the words out past her dry throat.

Sasuke rolled his eyes and walked back and grabbed her wrist. "We're going to go eat lunch now. Narutos paying," He told her, tugging her along.

Naruto scowled at him but gave Sakura a cheery grin and thumbs up that clearly said, 'Sure, why not?'

"Sasuke-kun, you're not going to tell me to stop being in love with you?" she timidly asked him.

Sasuke's dark black eyes found her and for Sakura time seemed to stop. "What's the point in doing that? You have better taste than Naruto does – you should be proud. Now start walking, I'm not going to drag you the whole way," he told her nonchalantly.

Sakura stared at him dumbfounded. Though she finally started walking her pace was too slow for her dark-haired teammate who continued to impatiently drag her along.

Sakura was practically brain dead from the shock that Sasuke-kun was maintaining physical contact with her – willingly. Inner Sakura was elated.

_'SHA FUCKING NARO BITCH! Sasuke-kun is holding my hand! Not Inos', Not Amis' not Sakuyas' but mine!'_

Sakura snapped back into reality.

_'YOU FUCKING RUINED THE MOMENT!'_

* * *

**SHINOBI DICTIONARY**

**Hinata:** Oh, she's teaching Naruto to act more maturely. I doubt she'll have much luck. Hell, I almost feel sorry for the poor girl!

**Naruto and Irukas' relationship:** no comment. **You sick ****s.**

**Hiding with camouflage technique:** Using part of their surroundings, the user will blend in with their background. Not effective on higher level ninjas that can sense chakra or people with high observational skills. The success of the technique is dependent on the skill of the user – an example of this would be Konohamaru who is very _very_ bad at it! Taught at the Ninja Academy.

**Moe:** A dangerous enemy to hardcore, brutal, otherwise tough ninjas. Equally prevalent in both men and women, no-one knows what exactly makes certain shinobi weak to moe and not others. A definite definition of moe does not exist, as ninjas have individual perceptions and ideas of moe. Tsume is one of the ninjas rumoured to be weak to moe.

**Sexy Jutsu:** The root of all truly great techniques in the world of Naruto.

**Sexy Jutsu –Kid Safe Edition!:** Looks more like internet ads for **** than actual ****. Uh… am I allowed to swear and stuff on here?

**Sexy YOUR TYPE Jutsu:** Using the skill of observation and analysis, a new jutsu is given life. Targeting your biggest dreams and secret desires, will you be able to resist?!

**Ebisu:** Isn't really into gingers. BDSM though… yes. He is.

**Sexy Me Oh My Jutsu:** An ingenious variation of the base Sexy Jutsu technique that simultaneously arouses, disgusts and mortifies the target of the technique. The user of this technique transforms into the target, gender reversed and with their sex appeal ramped up incredibly high. Suggestive attire/poses/clothing may be used.

**Naruto and Hinatas' relationship:** no comment.

**Hair Care:** An important aspect of shinobi life to many ninja, It has continued throughout time and become valued tradition in certain clans. Such as the Hatake clan, the Yamanaka clan, the Hyuuga clan and the Uchiha clan. One could argue that it is also part of the Akimichi clan, but due to their hair being grown for use in clan jutsu this is an ambiguous assumption at best. The Hyuuga clan and Uchiha clan took this aspect of shinobi life to new levels, ensuring that future generations of their clan would never be anywhere without looking catwalk ready. Even now the secret jutsus they developed to achieve follicle perfection are most revered and coveted.

**Big Head Jutsu:** A Konoha endemic jutsu used for Interrogation. Amplifies the size of the head, the volume of the voice and the throbbing temples of the user. As an effective technique, the use of it is highly monitored and practitioners of it keep secret their knowledge. Sakura Haruno and Umino Iruka are among the few that use it openly. Side Effects: May cause dizziness, irritation in the eyes, frequent headaches and nosebleeds.

**Naruto and Sakuras' relationship:** no comment.

**Sexy Sasuke Jutsu:** no comment on whether or not I have plans.

**That Sakura:** Is actually pretty nice. Damnit, now I can't bash her!

**That Sasuke:** But, I can still bash him! _He_ wasn't that nice!

**And Sakura and Sasukes' relationship:** If they get together it's kind of a two for the price of one deal, isn't it? Since she seems to have a multiple personality disorder… yeah… no comment.

* * *

END OF CHAPTER ONE

**C/N: Hey guys, so about this pairing thing. Naruto has a crush on Neji. Cannonically as most of you know, the original Naruto had a crush on Sakura. His reason for liking Sakura was because of her determination in chasing Sasuke, it reminds him of his determination to chase his own dreams. He also finds that she looks cutest when she's working hard to get Sasuke to notice in her.**

**So in my fic, Naruto who's friends with Hinata (who had the confidence to befriend her when they were kids since she didn't have a hugeass crush on her) gets a crush on Neji who she eventually meets through Hinata. For the same reasons Naruto in canon liked Sakura. Because despite being born a branch member, Neji tries his hardest to be an awesome ninja and master the gentle fist style, a goal he is well on his way to achieving.**

**Hinata seems to be rooting for them to end up together as well… **

**And Sakura likes Sasuke. Self-explanatory, really.**

**So these two crushes are the only established romance/pairing stuff for now but they can change and anyone can end up with anyone. If you have a favourite pairing, feel free to message me or leave a review and I'll give it serious consideration.**

No promises, though.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two: You should 'hn' more, Sasuke-kun!

* * *

**A/N: If Sasuke and his stupid hair offends you don't read this. Read about Kakashi and his stupid hair instead!**

**A/N: Thoughts – italicised and single quoted**

**Dialogue – double quoted**

**Emphasis in dialogue – single quotes or italics or both for extra flavour!**

**Inner Sakura – single quotes, italics and underlined.**

**A/N: Please review and fill the review hole in my heart.**

**A/N: Due to certain references the rating of this chapter has been bumped up from K+ to T**

* * *

After enjoying a very satisfying lunch, the three new teammates returned to the classroom to enjoy a very long wait for their jounin-sensei. No… actually, it wasn't very enjoyable at all. Finally two hours later their douchebag of a jounin-sensei showed up. Did they get an apology? No. All he said was, _'I don't think I like you three very much.'_

Now their spiky haired douchebag of a jounin-sensei smiled smugly at them from atop the roof of the academy. While they had to climb the stairs to get there the man had simply just disappeared and reappeared in a cloud of smoke. _'I wonder if he can teach me that jutsu!'_ Naruto thought to herself, excitedly.

"Alright, so let's do our introductions. Just say your name, likes, dislikes, hobbies and dreams… I guess."

"What about you, sensei?" Sakura asked.

"…My name is Kakashi Hatake, I have lots of hobbies, I don't really want to tell you guys my likes and dislikes and future dream? Hmmm..." Kakashi replied, not really telling them much at all. "Now your turn, starting with the strange orange girl over there."

"My name is Naruto Uzumaki! I like ramen, cup ramen, Ichiraku's ramen, cooking ramen-"

'_Does she think of nothing but ramen?'_ the other people on the rooftop all thought, sweatdrops sliding down their faces.

"-Hinata-chan, Neji and Iruka-sensei! I don't like waiting for ramen to cook or…" she paused sneakily, "waiting over two hours for a jounin-sensei to arrive." Kakashi pretended not to notice the not so subtle dig. "My hobbies are training and gardening and hanging out with Neji and Hinata-chan. And my dream is to become the Hokage and make everyone in the village finally look up to me and respect me!" Naruto declared, raising a hand and clenching it into a fist.

Kakashis' one visible eye widened at her bold declaration. _'Well, she sure grew up interesting'_, he thought to himself.

But he didn't say anything, just motioned at Sasuke to take his turn.

"Sasuke Uchiha. I dislike a lot of things but I don't really like much of anything... Except tomatoes I guess. And hair care." At this Sakura and Naruto exchanged looks but neither of them really knew much about the haircare thing.

'_There are still things I have to learn about Sasuke-kun!'_ Sakura thought determinedly.

Kakashi, on the other hand understood perfectly and respected him for it. _'A true Uchiha,'_ he thought to himself.

"My hobby, if you can call it that, is training. And hair care I guess. And I don't want to use the word dream, but my ambition is the revival of my clan and to kill a certain man.", he finished with a grim look on his face.

'_I didn't even know that Sasuke-kun thought about things like that!'_ Sakura realised, feeling somewhat ashamed. _'There's still so much I have to learn…' _Determinedly, she decided that if there was any way she could help him with his goals she would at least give it a shot.

Kakashis' eye narrowed in contemplation. Pretty much what he'd expected, after all. He motioned to Sakura to continue.

"My name is Sakura Haruno! I like reading, studying, doing well on books and.. Sasuke-kun," well it wasn't like they didn't already know, after all. "I don't really dislike anything… maybe orange tracksuits," she said, making a not too subtle dig at Naruto's favourite attire. Naruto just rolled her eyes, not bothering to defend her usual outfit. "As for hobbies I don't really have anyway… my dream is to become strong and protect a certain man," she finished.

"Wow, really? I had no idea you had such an awesome dream Sakura-chan!" Naruto exclaimed. She did not at all connect Sakura's decision to protect Sasuke with her current dream to protect a certain _man_.

While Sakura was busy blushing and stuttering, Kakashi and Sasuke both had the same thought. _'Though it's totally obvious who you're talking about…'_ Still, their private estimations of the skinny pink-haired girl rose.

"Then, since we've all finished introducing ourselves, tomorrow we'll start our duties officially," Kakashi announced, breaking the silence.

'_Yeah, though __you__ never really introduced yourself,'_ the three preteens thought exasperatedly.

"What kind of awesome duties will we be doing?" Naruto asked. "I want to rescue a princess!"

"As long as we get real combat experience I'm not too fussed," Sakura chirped in. Sasuke, in typical Sasuke fashion chose to nod rather than agree out loud.

Kakashi had to struggle not to laugh out loud at that. _'Even if they do manage to pass my test they'll have months and months of D-ranks before they get to have any 'real combat experience,'_ he thought gleefully. "Ahem, first the four of us have to do some survival training."

"Uh, sensei, maybe you forgot but that was why we were at the academy. We've had six years of training." Naruto rolled her eyes.

Kakashi snickered. "This isn't regular training. Actually it's kind of funny..."

"What's so funny, sensei?" Sakura asked.

"Well only 9 people from your year are going to graduate. The rest go back to the academy. This will be a super difficult exam with a failure rate of 66% AND _I_ will be your opponent!" Kakashi gloated, basking in the startled looks on their faces.

Electricified goldfish, they looked like with lips wide open and eyes blankly staring ahead in shock. Naruto's blond spiky hair was even standing on end. "B-But we already did a test! Why did we even graduate then?!" Naruto asked angrily. She was the one most upset by this, considering all the effort she'd put into learning that stupid clone jutsu.

"That was just a test to select those that get a chance to become Genin. You can think of it as a preliminary test.", Kakashi smiled at them. He was enjoying this... maybe too much? What a shame he'd left his camera at home.

"Tomorrow _I_ will be testing you, so don't forget to bring all of your shinobi tools. And don't eat breakfast, you'll just throw up."

When Kakashi used that strange jutsu to disappear from the rooftop again, all three graduates were still sitting there with the same shell-shocked expressions on their faces.

"Ugh... What should I do?" Naruto muttered to herself. Sakura heard her and frowned. What could she do? If she didn't pass this test there would be no way to protect Sasuke-kun, who would definitely pass for sure! But she knew there was no way she could defeat a jounin on her own.

Wait…on her own? Sakura looked at her teammates. If they were a team then there was no reason she had to fight him alone...

Sakura sighed. Her planswould have to wait till tomorrow. "Okay, guys I've got a few ideas... About the test tomorrow..."

* * *

Naruto woke up bright and early the next day. She was feeling particularly awesome, since this morning she would have an advantage in their test. Last night, to her and Sasukes' surprise Sakura had stopped them from leaving because she said she had an idea. That idea led to them walking up to every single villager in town and asking about Kakashi. Naruto didn't exactly understand what the whole point of this was, so she had started complaining loudly to Sasuke.

After blatantly ignoring her for as long as possible, he finally rolled his eyes and said, "You don't even know that? Seriously, just how did you manage to graduate?! We're gathering information, moron."

Eventually after asking around they struck gold. A failed Genin graduate that had taken Kakashis' test before. Apparently Kakashi was a 'lazy bastard' who probably used the same test pretty much every year. In the end all he left them with was the cryptic advice, "No matter what eat a full breakfast." Naruto had thought he was pretty shady but Sakura decided to take his words at face value, so who was she to argue?

She was just happy that she could eat her usual seven bowls of ramen. And a nice tall glass of milk. To her all that wandering around justified itself because she got to eat a big breakfast as usual, in the end.

"Good morning Sakura-chan, Sasuke!" she chirped, arriving at the specified place of appointment. Sasuke barely deigned to nod but Sakura greeted her with a happy smile. Maybe too happy.

Naruto did not like the look on her face _at all._

"Can I call you with chan?" Sakura asked her.

Naruto let out a sigh of relief. So that was all? "Sure, Sakura-chan, call me whatever you want!" she smiled at her.

"Thanks, Naru Naru-chan!" Sakura grinned.

Narutos' mouth dropped. Out of all the nicknames she'd gotten, no one had ever quite called her _that _before. _'Should I be flattered or disgusted?'_ she wondered. On one hand… they were teammates, she had told Sakura-chan she could call her whatever she wanted, clearly Sakura-chan actually thought it was a cute name and it was still better than 'demon-child', but on the other…

"Naru Naru-chan?" Naruto groaned.

"It's cute, isn't it?" Sakura beamed.

"You could call me Naruto-chan instead?" Naruto suggested hopefully.

Sakuras' nose wrinkled. "That's not a very feminine name. Naruto means _fishcake_," she pointed out.

"I read it as whirlpool, actually. Which is an _awesome_ name," Naruto objected.

"That's still not very feminine." Sakura pointed out.

"But you added –chan to it! That's very feminine!" Naruto protested.

Sakura just shook her head slowly at this. "You'll understand when you're older," was all she would say.

"Actually…" Sasuke started to say.

Naruto looked at him hopefully.

"Like I said, Sakura has better taste than you. You should listen to her," Sasuke said. Then he turned around –out of Sakuras line of sight- and _smirked _at her.

Naruto looked away from him in disgust. "Okay... it is kind of… cute," she gave in, lying through her teeth. Sakura-chan just looked so happy that she had agreed, Naruto didn't have the heart to fight her on the issue.

'_It could be worse,'_ she consoled herself, _'Sasuke could be the one calling me Naru Naru-chan instead. Now __that__ would be gross!'_ she made a face.

* * *

Hours later Kakashi finally arrived. As one Naruto and Sakura stood up and yelled at him while Sasuke settled for folding his arms and glaring venomously at their new sensei. Kakashi merely smiled at them and set an alarm clock on a stump in the clearing.

"Okay, the timer on this is set to go off at noon. I have here two bells," Kakashi raised the bells to show them and shook them slightly.

"Before that timer goes off you have to take a bell from me. If you don't you won't get any lunch but you will be forced to watch me eat in front of you instead."

_'So that's why he told us not to eat any breakfast,_' the three graduates realised.

"If you don't manage to get a bell off me you will be tied to a stump while I and your teammates enjoy our lunch and then you will be sent back to the academy for failing. So that means that out of the three of you, a minimum of one and a maximum of three students will definitely fail." Kakashi gleefully explained.

"You can use all of the ninja tools available to a graduate. That means no high-grade explosive tags or poisoned senbon obviously. Taijutsu, Ninjutsu and any Genjutsu you might know, you can use them all. You won't be able to succeed if you don't come at me with the intent to kill so... Please, don't make this 'too' boring." He eye-smiled at all of them.

Sakura frowned at him. He was obviously trying to provoke them, but why? The test hadn't even started yet.

Naruto, on the other hand took the bait, hook line and sinker.

"We're the ones who are bored, three-hours-late sensei! You should watch your ass or you might be dead before you know it!" She declared, glaring fiercely at him.

Sakura stared at her incredulously. _'What is she doing? Why is she provoking a jounin-sensei?_' She turned her head to exchange a look of disbelief with Sasuke and was even more surprised when he reciprocated.

"In real life those with no talent always bark the loudest. Well ignore the three times failed student and start when I say"-

Naruto whose expression had been getting fiercer and fiercer while listening to their instructor suddenly lunged at him with three kunai in her hands and it was all Sakura and Sasuke could do to hold her back.

_'When did those kunai get there?'_ Sakura thought, eyebrows shooting upwards in surprise.

_'Fast!'_ thought Sasuke.

Kakashi looked at the three kids in surprise. "Nice teamwork, you two. Quick thinking." He nodded to Sasuke and Sakura who looked proud and blushed respectively. "And Naruto", he started. Naruto glared at him, daring him to say something insulting. "You're pretty fast to the draw, aren't you?" Kakashi eye-smiled at her. Naruto's mouth widened into a comical 'O' before it quickly spread into a pleased grin.

"If you remember to take me seriously like that you might have a small chance of passing my test. In fact, it seems like you guys might not be all that bad." Kakashi ignored the pleased flushes on their faces, all of their faces and gave the command.

"Now, Start!"

* * *

_'So the first thing they should be doing is... hiding themselves well in the surrounding area.' _Kakashi thought to himself and scanned the area around him. Just as he thought, Sasuke and Sakura were well hidden in the surrounding trees and bushes - though of course he could detect them - and Naruto was...

Naruto was...

"Hey, you're strong aren't you? Come and fight me!"

Standing right in front of him.

"Just out of curiosity, did you ever pay any attention to your classes in the academy?" Kakashi asked her idly. Though it was already obvious what the answer was. The answer was '_No_'.

"Just out of curiosity do you ever pay any attention to your hair?" Naruto retorted.

Kakashis' hands flew defensively to his hair. There was nothing wrong with his hair! His hair was fine!

He decided it was time to teach this little girl a lesson.

Naruto leapt back from him, eyes to the ground. "Caltrops!" *she cursed. Taking advantage of her momentary distraction, Kakashi moved towards her at a speed she couldn't hope to match and punched her in the stomach. Her body slammed into a tree with a solid sounding '_thunk_'.

"Ninjas never take their eyes off an enemy," Kakashi lectured indifferently.

Naruto hesitantly got back to her feet, breathing heavily. "Maybe you were just too ugly for me to directly look at!" she shouted back, somewhat nonsensically.

Kakashis' one visible eye widened marginally. To get up from a blow like that in less than one minute... That was some stamina, alright.

"Alright then," He whipped out his favourite novel, one with a bright orange cover. "Lesson number one - Taijutsu. Let's see if you can beat me."

"... Uh, what's the book for? Is that a ninja book with ninja weapons in it or something?" Naruto asked, scratching her head.

How had she managed to come to _that_ conclusion? _'In a way, I think she's overestimating me,'_ Kakashi thought to himself.

"No Naruto, this is a book from my favourite series, Icha Icha. I just wanted to read a bit more. You can attack me while I'm reading, don't worry about it, I won't get hurt." Kakashi explained to her without taking his eyes off the book.

"Icha Icha paradise?! I know about those - that's that perverted book series! Sensei, you might not know this but in certain circles I'm known as _'Naruto the pervert buster'_!"

_'No, you aren't,'_ thought Sasuke and Sakura.

"I'm gonna bust you and that book of yours up so badly you won't be able to read another page!"

Naruto launched herself at him, fist outstretched to punch the book right out of his hands. Kakashi merely moved the hand not supporting his book and blocked her with an open palm. _'I'm not done yet!_' thought Naruto, and using the momentum from the punch, kicked out in a high arc now aiming for Kakashis' mask.

Kakashi dropped down into a low crouch, avoiding the kick but he was underestimating Naruto's speed. Naruto grinned at him. Now she had him! She pushed herself backwards from her current position, landing on Kakashis' back and pressing him down into the ground. Her next move was to hook her leg around his neck and crush his larynx between her leg and her hands joined together until he surrendered!

"Ha, take that! I spent all night training with a motionless Kakashi doll for this!" Naruto crowed, moving into the next stage of her attack.

Then from directly behind her came the words "Didn't I tell you that ninjas don't take their eyes off an enemy?"

Huh?! At those words a cloud of smoke emerged, covering Naruto and her 'enemy' and then quickly dissipated. And what it revealed was... _'I've been trying to get a log to surrender all this time?!'  
_  
_'Kawarimi Jutsu. That's an academy technique!_' Sakura realised.  
_  
'When did he pull the switch? I didn't notice at all,'_ thought Sasuke.

_'Oh crap,'_ thought Naruto.

Kakashi swiftly moved his hands into the Tiger seal position, not giving Naruto any time to escape.

_'No way… is he actually going to use a fire technique?_' Sasuke thought.

Sakura though had an even more foreboding feeling. Chalk it down to womanly intuition.

"Naruto, watch out!" she yelled, throwing a kunai at Naruto, which snagged the shoulder of her jumpsuit and dragged her backwards along its line of movement until it met a tree and sunk into it.

Kakashi blinked. That was some quick thinking and a nice display of teamwork. Naruto was now looking around in confusion, pinned to a tree 50 metres from him before he had even started his technique.

Still, you didn't get to be a jounin by being sentimental and Sakura had just given her position away. Big mistake.

Within a second, Kakashi appeared behind Sakura, fingers again clasped together in the Tiger seal.

"Ancient Secret Taijutsu technique of Konoha! 1000 years of Pain!"

Sakura went flying, shrieking all the way and plummeted into the large lake towards the far side of the clearing.

_'He just poked her in the ass.'_ Naruto and Sasuke stared in horror at their new maybe sensei.  
_  
__'That. Fucking. Asshole. I WAS SAVING THAT FOR SASUKE!'_ Inner Sakura roared.

Within a second she emerged from the lake, throwing another kunai at Sasuke pinning him to the tree by his ridiculously large collar and then yelling a battle cry all the while as she leapt out of the water and ran across the clearing, grabbing Naruto and Sasuke and retreating to the trees.

_'What just happened?'_ thought Kakashi bemusedly. Oddly enough he could swear he felt a massive amount of killing intent directed at him and a feeling of foreboding was starting to give him goosebumps. With a silent scoff he pushed that feeling of foreboding back into his head where it would then be used for fights against actual dangerous ninja. They were just kids, after all. What could they possibly do to a former Anbu captain?

* * *

Kakashi was starting to get bored. All of them - even Naruto - were hiding extremely well. He had no idea where they were. It was starting to put even him on edge.

_'I'm sure they'll show themselves any time now,_' He comforted himself.

Meanwhile in the trees...

"So you're all clear on what we're going to do?" Sakura asked.

Sasuke cocked his head questioningly, being too lazy to actually vocalize his question.

"Sasuke-kun, just imagine if that had happened to you instead of me. Wouldn't you want to be avenged?" Sakura asked patiently.

Sasuke blanched. Kisses were one thing… but butt pokes? And not even from a fangirl but from an older man who was supposed to be their sensei… That was just creepy.

"I would want you to take revenge if that happened to me as well, Sakura-chan. I'm behind you one hundred percent." Naruto determinedly bumped fists with Sakura.

"And you did kind of sacrifice yourself for me even if you didn't mean to..." Naruto trailed off.

"So Sasuke-kun, are you in or out?" Sakura asked.

"Let me blow stuff up and you have a deal," Sasuke replied, still looking vaguely unnerved by the whole butt poke thing.

"Great! Then you can help me set up the ninja wire and explosive tags around this area!" Sakura beamed.

* * *

"Kakashi-sensei! Fight me!" Kakashi sighed as the orange figure of his... least intelligent student came into view. Had she learned nothing?

"Shadow clone Jutsu!" Naruto yelled and in an instant, ten more Naruto's had appeared from thin air.

"Oh, you know a solid clone technique?" Kakashi was pleasantly surprised. "Of course you realise this makes no difference, right? No matter how many of you there are, with your skills you have no hope of defeating me."

Naruto grimaced. "Stupid Kakashi-sensei! I can beat you with my hands tied behind my back!" In a snap ten more Naruto's were added to the crowd. And then they all rushed as one at Kakashi and a maelstrom of chops, punches and kicks was released.

"Predictable." thought Kakashi and in a matter of moments he had dispelled all but one Naruto. "That one must be the real one." Kakashis eyes narrowed as he prepared to finish the battle.

Naruto squawked in alarm. Where had all the other Naruto's gone? And so quickly? She jumped to her feet and quickly ran in the opposite direction, abandoning the plan.

"I can always make more clones! It's not over yet!" she declared.

Kakashi sighed and turned around. "I've already figured out your plan. You were using your clones to lead me to the water and it failed. Ninjas are always looking underneath the underneath."

Naruto's jaw dropped in surprise. How had he figured out Sakura-chan's plan so quickly?

"It was probably... Sakura who came up with the plan, right? Out of the three of you she's supposed to be the one with the biggest intellect." While he spoke Kakashi was keeping a careful eye on the area, anticipating a counter move from Sasuke or Sakura any time soon. "What I don't understand though is why? Getting me to the trees would be better, since you all are much smaller than me and could work more effectively in the more cramped area, while my movement would be hindered."

Naruto started laughing. "You're so stupid Kakashi-sensei! Sakura-chan knew you'd realise what we were doing immediately if we tried that! As soon as my clones led you into the water Sasuke was going to spit fire at the water and fry you in superheated steam! Then while you tried to escape Sakura was going to get the bells!" She crowed.

A sweat drop slowly made its way down Kakashis' face disappearing into the fabric of his mask_. 'She does realise she just told me the whole plan, right? Well it wasn't a bad plan and it might have even worked... if Naruto had been anywhere near as stealthy as she should have been.'_

While Kakashi was in the middle of thinking, and as his guard appeared to be down, a Fuma shuriken appeared out of nowhere, careening towards him. Kakashi leisurely reached out and stopped the shurikens' movement, catching it around the circular hole in the middle.

"Wh-what the, that wasn't part of the plan! Sasuke, you bastard!" Naruto yelled.

Kakashis' eyebrows drew together. So it was Sasuke who had thrown the shuriken. That meant Sakura still had to be accounted for.

"They're getting desperate. After all you messed up their carefully thought out plan," he told Naruto.

At that moment, from a different direction a string of ninja wire came flying towards him, kunai slipping up and down its length. If successful, that trick could potentially decapitate an enemy. Kakashi merely sliced through the string with the Fuma Shuriken still in his hand and watched the kunai clatter harmlessly to the ground.

"I'm guessing that was Sakura's move." He commented.

"We can still use that plan!" Naruto shouted. "I just have to make more shadow clones!"

"That might have worked...if you hadn't already told me all the details of your plan." At Kakashis words Naruto's face fell. She hadn't done that, had she? Feeling a little depressed Naruto's gaze dropped to the ground in front of her. _'Sorry Sakura. Sorry Sasuke. It seems like I let you down.'  
_  
"Didn't I tell you not to take your eyes off an enemy?"

Naruto looked up and her gaze met the one visible eye of her sensei. She closed her eyes in anticipation of the blow she was going to receive.

But-

The blow never came.

Because Naruto dissipated. In a cloud of smoke.

"Now!" Sakura yelled as she made the hand seals to detonate the tags scattered around the area. Sasuke 'hned' an affirmation and as the tags detonated around Kakashi he leapt out of hiding and fired a Great Fireball Jutsu into the middle of the area, further enhancing the explosive power of the tags.

Kakashi was seriously taken aback at this but he did not lose his head and merely channelled some chakra to his feet, jumping supernaturally high and avoiding the jutsu. When he landed again the fire had gone and there was only smoke left. Lots of smoke.

_'Can't breathe,'_ Kakashi realised. There was too much smoke. He dropped low to the floor to ease his breathing while he crawled out of the smoke cloud.

And then he heard the sound of an incoming object and two logs hurtled towards him obviously meant to make a log and Kakashi sandwich.

"Fuck!" Kakashi leapt backwards. Sakura had probably planned that second backup trap. Then he caught sight of a flash of red on the logs and groaned. Gathering chakra to his feet, he again jumped as the logs crashed into each other and exploded into a mass of fire.

_'That Sakura is one vindictive little witch.'_ Kakashi thought, eyeing the flames he had just barely avoided. _'What kind of demon would think of sticking explosive tags on the logs?'_

And then Sasuke, his position obscured by smoke, fired another Great Fireball directly at Kakashi.  
_  
'Are you kidding me?!'_ Kakashi was seriously beginning to reconsider his opinion of the three brats.

As he gathered chakra to his mouth to fire off his own Great Fireball to negate the Uchiha boys' technique he saw something that _almost_ made him whimper. _Almost_.

There was another Naruto clone, fist outstretched, grinning widely and flying forward from inside the fireball jutsu, aiming for his face.

Suppressing curse words entirely unsuitable for young children to hear, Kakashi bent backwards at the waist and avoided both the clone and the fireball technique.

And then another Naruto was thrown upwards by another clone and punched him in the stomach and he couldn't possibly avoid it from his current position and crap that had actually _hurt_.

* * *

"That was a very creative strategy." Kakashi told them, glaring at them fiercely and making them tremble under the force of his killing intent.

Naruto - the real Naruto, the one who had finally managed to hit him - grinned at him, though she still looked terrified. "Yeah, there was fire and there was smoke and there was bangs! So many bangs!" she laughed.

Sasuke crossed his arms, smirked and let out a small pleased 'hn'. He looked terrified too.

Sakura placed her hand on her hips and crowed excitedly, "And it was my plan, sensei! I planned it all start to finish!" She also looked terrified and her shoulders were shaking.

Kakashi shook his head in resignation. "I shouldn't have underestimated you guys. Even if one of you is wearing orange. You three are probably the most evil brats I have ever met."

The three of them did not seem the least bit chastened by this and instead looked excessively pleased with themselves.

"But you do realise, that was one hit. You didn't defeat me, and you didn't get the bells. I know not to underestimate you guys now and there's three minutes left till noon. What do you plan on doing now?" he asked pleasantly.

To his surprise, none of them looked particularly upset or even surprised by his words. Instead Sasuke smirked, Naruto grinned and Sakura giggled at him.

"No, sensei. What are you going to do?" she asked.

"Huh?"

"Yeah" Naruto sniggered. "What are you going to do about your precious... Icha...Icha... Paradise!"

Kakashi slowly looked to his right hand in which he had been holding the Holy Grail Of Literature. It was on fire.

"Hn," Sasuke smirked at him. He was too dignified to laugh. "It's impossible for an Uchiha to use their signature clan jutsu and miss."

Sakura kept giggling as Kakashi froze in shock, staring at his beloved Icha Icha turning to ashes right in front of his eyes. "That trap wasn't meant for you from the beginning. Now maybe you'll think twice before you go around poking girls in the butt!"

Kakashi sat there eyes fixated on his pride, his joy, his love powerless to stop Naruto as she unfastened the bells from his pouch and tossed both of them over to Sasuke and Sakura respectively.

As the last of the ashes of his beloved Icha Icha were blown off his palm by the wind, he stood up brokenly and staggered towards them.

"The three of you..."

They all looked up excitedly at him waiting to hear the good news.

"FAIL!"

They all looked down at the ground wondering where they had gone wrong.

"Is what I'd like to say... But technically you did pass, after all. This test was actually about teamwork. The bells were there as an incentive to divide you but you guys probably figured that out." Kakashi explained. The three of them looked at each other. They hadn't figured that out at all. They'd completely forgotten about that. "A ninja must always be looking underneath the underneath and you three did that perfectly. In fact I think I've learnt a lesson about looking underneath the underneath too and I will never ever underestimate anyone who wears orange or has pink hair ever again. You all worked as a team - even though you did so because of different reasons that I would have liked - and you even managed to get the bells."

Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke were starting to look excited again and they waited with anticipation for his next words.

"So... you pass. But-" and here his voice got stern. "First I expect a replacement copy of the book you destroyed and a personal letter of apology from each of you to the author for destroying one of his precious books. And a 2500 word essay on the beauty of Icha Icha and why you should never ever destroy one of those precious books ever again." He ordered.

Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke stared at him in disbelief.

"Do I make myself clear?" He asked, letting a bit of killing intent escape with his words.

They all gulped. "Yes, Kakashi-sensei." They chorused.

* * *

**SHINOBI DICTIONARY**

**Caltrops: **A ninja tool used to impair movement. Small spiked objects that are thrown on the ground in front of the target.

**Double clone diversion: **Shadow clones and regular clones are used at the same time, confusing the enemy as to which are real and which aren't. The enemy's ability to discern where attacks are coming from will then significantly decrease.

**Double Suicide Clone:** The user creates a clone and deliberately taunts the enemy, withdrawing to a location where a trap has been prepared. Being an illusion the clone will not trigger the trap and create the appearance of this being regular ground. When the enemy shinobi rushes into the area the trap will go off and the clone will be dispersed.

**Chakra-assisted movement: **Pretty self-explanatory really. A basic of chuunin and higher ranked combat.

**Clone Blanket Fire:** The user uses a fire jutsu – almost any can be used- and creates a clone that bursts through the flames to attack the enemy. The enemy believing this to be a real threat will either evade, block or counterattack providing the opportunity to mount a rear assault.

**Clone-Assisted Movement: **A technique that can be used by any ninja able to use solid clones. Basically the clones can help the user to quickly move or evade attacks by boosting their movements. Example: Throwing the user up to achieve a higher altitude than the user could by jumping.

**Stupid jokes:** In this chapters' dictionary there are none. You're welcome.

* * *

END OF CHAPTER TWO

**C/N: To forestall any possible complaints about super powered characters let me just say that Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke defeated Kakashi with 'Academy-level' skills. Apart from the shadow clones and Sasukes' fire breath. The only reason they managed to take down Kakashi is because (a) Sakura uses her big brain for once, (b) He uses academy and genin-level skills to fight them and (c) He has an exploitable weakness. If the test conditions were to knock him out they probably would not have won. **


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three: Well, it _is_ called the Village hidden in the _Leaves_ for a reason!

* * *

**A/N: If you dislike Kakashi being a douchebag read something else! Because I gave him all my sidehearts and he gave them back!**

**A/N: Er, what I meant to say was: Kakashi is a bit OOC. Since all he ever managed to teach them pre-timeskip in canon was how to climb a tree, and Sasuke his Chidori It was a necessary change to better facilitate the plot of the story. He had them for months and months and taught them nothing! So he's you know… competent. But still a lazy douchebag.**

**Does this make my story au or for want of a nail then?**

**A/N: Thoughts – italicised and single quoted**

**Dialogue – double quoted**

**Emphasis in dialogue – single quotes or italics or both for extra flavour!**

**Inner Sakura – single quotes, italics and underlined.**

**A/N: Please review and fill the review hole in my heart.**

**A/N: And the rating is back to K+**

* * *

"Sakura, you stay." Kakashi had ordered.

As the other students left, Sakura remained sitting on a tree stump, holding Kakashis' empty bento box. Since she'd just dropped her diet the day before, she hadn't been able to finish it and let Naruto eat the rest of the food. It had been surprisingly tasty, though.

"Kakashi-sensei, what's this about?" she asked, as soon as Sasuke and Naruto were out of earshot.

"Your dress."

"Oh, do you like it?" Sakura flushed happily. "My mom made it for me. Red is a Haruno-clan tradition. Pretty, right?"

Kakashi stared at her for a while, trying to figure out a nice way to say what he was going to say and Sakura fidgeted self-consciously under his gaze.

Finally, he figured out what he was going to say. "I... Approve the inclusion of the clan symbol. And it's reasonably well made. But... Sakura, your hair is pink. Red clashes."

Sakura looked utterly desolate so he awkwardly patted her on the head. This was going to be hard for her to hear, but it needed to be said. For both her sake, and her teammates, who had to see her every day.

Relentlessly he continued on. "And your dress tapers down at the hips and you're wearing loose white pants underneath... It makes your hips look fat."

Sakura stared at him in horror. "What about my thighs, they look okay, don't they?" she pleaded.

Kakashi sighed. He couldn't believe he was the one that had to give her this lecture. "Your clan symbol is at the bottom of your dress, which also draws the eye to your legs. Ideally, you should have your clan symbol on a shoulder or a sleeve."

"So my thighs look...?"

Kakashi sighed again. Why didn't they teach you how to handle delicate preteens in the jounin-sensei training? "They look... Yeah, I can't figure out a nice way to say this. They look fat." he told her reluctantly, watching her face lose all hope.

"And your clan symbol is too big. It's basically a big target saying 'Stab me! Stab me in the thighs, I like being stabbed!' And then the dress length, it can get caught up on things while you're fighting and you could end up losing a head. That outfit of yours is practically suicidal."

"Well, what about Naru Naru-chans' and Sasuke-kuns' clothes? You can't say they're practical!" she replied defensively.

"Sasuke is an Uchiha. He would absolutely _murder _anyone who dared to damage his clothes," Kakashi grinned at the thought. "As for Naruto – it's sad, but she's already beyond help. You should be happy you can still be saved, at least," he advised.

All hope left Sakuras' small frame again and she slumped down gloomily. "Well, I was thinking of buying some new training clothes anyway. But if I can't wear red, I don't know what to buy."

Kakashi sighed gloomily again. He couldn't believe he was saying this but... "I'll take you shopping."

* * *

Sakura took one final look at her new clothes before walking into the clearing. A slim fitting, short sleeved athletic jacket in a contrast of soft yellow and light grey, tucked in white t shirt with ¾ length sleeves and practical black shorts hitting a bit above mid-thigh. They looked flattering on her and there was no doubt that Kakashi-sensei had good taste. Surprisingly so, considering what he read. But she still felt self-conscious. What would Sasuke-kun think?

Warily, she walked into the clearing of Training Grounds 7. Sasuke and Naruto looked up when she arrived and then froze, eyes and mouths hanging open - or in Sasuke's case expression exactly the same as normal. She could tell he was surprised though.

Sakura awkwardly started fiddling with the hem of her new jacket. "Uh... Does it look okay?" she asked cautiously.

Naruto and Sasuke didn't reply; apparently too busy goggling at her startling change of attire.

"Oh come on, it can't be _that_ shocking."

Still they said nothing, eyes fixed stupidly on her.

"My clothes aren't that bad, surely!" Sakura exclaimed, defensively crossing her arms and shooting them a look.

"Who cares about that?" Naruto said, looking confused, "What happened to your hair?"

"You mean the plaits?" Sakura frowned.

"It looks shorter…" Sasuke commented.

"That's because I plaited it..."

"It is shorter!" Naruto realised. "Why did you cut your hair?"

"I didn't cut it...? Hair looks shorter when you plait it," Sakura said, bewildered.

Sasuke shook his head at Naruto's apparent confusion. "Moron."

"Why would you think I cut my hair anyway?" Sakura asked, exasperatedly.

"To look cooler?" Naruto asked.

"Because you decided to be practical, and avoid your hair being a possible handhold for enemy shinobi?" Sasuke asked. Then, he and Naruto looked at each other and laughed.

'_SASUKE-KUN LAUGHED FOR THE FIRST TIME SINCE THE MASSACRE OH MY LORD,'_ though actually, it had been more of a snarky laugh than a joyful laugh, Inner Sakura was overjoyed.

Regular Sakura was too busy worrying about her hairstyle to notice. "I just felt like a change but if it looks so bad-" Sakura huffed.

"It doesn't look bad; it suits you more this way. Forehead protectors are meant to be worn on the forehead anyway," Naruto interrupted. "Now you can head-butt people using the official shinobi technique!"

"Like I said, you at least have better taste than Naruto. And it's more practical to wear the forehead protector on the forehead anyway," Sasuke said, shrugging nonchalantly.

Sakura flushed, surprised at receiving an almost-if-you-squinted-from-far-away-maybe compliment from Sasuke. Shyly, she started playing with her hem again. "And the clothes?" she asked hopefully.

"I appreciate the absence of red. And the absence of clashing. Again, better taste than Naruto," Sasuke commented.

"I appreciate the… yellow", Naruto commented, stepping forward to examine her jacket more closely. "But it would be nicer if it was bright yellow. Maybe I should wear some yellow too..." She trailed off.

Sakura's eyes widened in horror.

Sasuke apparently agreed with her because he pulled Naruto back, away from her. "You don't even know what bad taste you have, do you? That's borderline offensive." He glowered.

* * *

When Kakashi finally showed up the first thing he did was collect their letters of apology, their 2500 word essays and his signed replacement copy of Icha Icha Paradise. He was impressed the copy they gave him was signed. _'That was a nice touch,'_ thought Kakashi.

"Alright," he eye smiled at them. "As a reward for getting me a signed copy of the book, and Sakura finally wearing her forehead protector on her forehead-" Sakura blushed "-I'll forego the morning training today and we can go and pick up our first mission!"

"Yay! You're awesome, Pedo-sensei!" Naruto cheered.

"Pedo-sensei?" Kakashi asked pleasantly.

"Yeah, Pedo-sensei!"

Kakashis' eyebrow twitched. "Why are you calling me that?"

"People who molest children are called paedophiles," Naruto explained.

"I am _not _a paedophile,"

"But you are a Pedo-sensei, Pedo-sensei!" Naruto insisted.

"I am _not _a _Pedo-sensei_," Kakashi insisted, releasing a small amount of killing intent.

"Right! O-of course you're not, Pedo-sensei!" Naruto gasped.

"Naruto," Kakashi eye smiled at her, releasing even more killing intent ", don't call me _that_ ever again."

"Y-yes! I'll never call you _that_ anymore, Pedo-sensei!" Naruto squeaked.

Kakashi looked at her in exasperation. How was he going to get rid of that moniker?!

"Kakashi-sensei, I don't think you can get her to stop calling you that," Sakura explained gently.

"But… my reputation!" he protested.

"What reputation?" Sasuke snorted. "You read porn in public."

Oh, right.

"All right, let's go collect our mission then," he told them. Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke all followed him obediently as he headed towards the Hokage tower. When he got there they headed towards the Hokages' office, to collect their first mission as genin. Normally missions would be collected from the chuunin administration in the lower levels of the tower but the Hokage liked to hand out graduates' first official missions in person.

Kakashi suspected he liked seeing the bamboozled look on their faces when they realised their first mission was just a bunch of menial chores. He enjoyed that look too. He had even brought along a small camera.

"Ah, team seven. Here for your first mission, I presume?" the Hokage smiled warmly at them when they were admitted into his office.

"Yes, Hokage-sama. What mission do you have for us?" Kakashi asked politely.

The Hokage tossed a mission scroll to Kakashi. "See for yourselves. I particularly picked out this mission _especially_ for Team 7," he said, smiling conspiratorially at Kakashi. Who took the opportunity to pull out his camera.

Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke all eagerly crowded around the scroll as Kakashi unrolled it. As expected the expressions of excitement and pride slowly slid off their faces, leaving growing incredulity in its place.

_Click!_

Kakashi looked in delight at the screen of his camera. That was definitely going in his album.

"I request a copy," the Hokage said.

Kakashi bowed deeply. "As Hokage-sama wishes."

"…." they were still staring at the scroll.

"Gardening?" Sakura finally asked.

* * *

"That was the most freaking useless mission ever!" Sakura complained, smelling strongly of plant fertilizer.

"I didn't think it was so bad," Naruto commented. She had done a good job pruning the plants, and the store owner had given her a small Venus fly trap to thank her. Naruto loved it – Sakura couldn't understand why, it had _teeth _- and was currently transporting it in the crook of her arm and occasionally petting it.

"Hn," Sasuke contributed. He had a thoroughly exasperated look on his face and also smelt strongly of plant fertilizer.

Kakashi eye-smiled at his cute team. "But you all did such a great job! Well except for Sasuke and Sakura that is."

Sakura and Sasuke shared a look. Next time they'd make him do the gardening, for sure.

"Eh, really? I did a good job, Pedo-sensei?!" Naruto asked excitedly.

"Yeah, you did. In fact I think that old store owner took a real shine to you. He wrote a glowing report of your abilities," Kakashi smiled at her.

Naruto beamed back at him, smile momentarily dazzling. "I did a good job, I did a good job!" she cheered.

"But that's not fair Kakashi-sensei. Naru Naru-chan said her hobby is gardening, of course she'd work better than me or Sasuke!" Sakura pointed out.

"Sakura, don't blame Naruto for having more feminine qualities than you," Kakashi admonished, leaning over to ruffle Naruto's hair. Sakura's eyes narrowed in response. Naru Naru-chan was _NOT_ more feminine than her! In terms of being feminine she absolutely would not, could not lose to a Ramen guzzling, Orange wearing, Sexy Jutsu using, Neji chasing kunoichi!

"So what are we gonna do now, Pedo-sensei?" Naruto asked.

"Now," Kakashi smiled, "we're going to start our training."

* * *

Kakashi, Sakura, Sasuke and Naruto all made their way back to training ground seven. When they got there, all three twelve year olds looked at Kakashi expectantly and in answer he held out a closed fist.

"You will all be training with these," he explained, directing their gazes towards his fist.

"Training with what, Kakashi-sensei?" Sakura was the first to ask.

Kakashi slowly unfurled his fingers to reveal three leaves in the palm of his hand, perfectly flat and undamaged. "I'm sure you guys all remember the leaf-training exercise from the academy, right?" he asked.

They all nodded in affirmation at him. "Are we going to be doing an advanced form of that exercise, sensei?" Sakura asked.

"No," Kakashi smiled. "You will be doing the exact same exercise you learnt in the academy." Before they could protest he continued, "So, who knows how to do the leaf-training exercise? Put your hands in the air if you can do it."

Sakura and Sasuke both promptly raised their hands and Naruto looked away feeling a little ashamed of herself.

"Good," Kakashi smiled at them. "Since only Naruto doesn't know the exercise, she'll have to learn how to do it before I can start teaching all of you properly. Sakura and Sasuke, help Naruto learn the exercise and come get me when you're done."

Then he handed the leaves over to Naruto who held them very carefully, and ambled away to sit at the base of the stump and flicked open up his new replacement copy of Icha Icha Paradise.

"Seriously?" Sakura groaned.

Sasuke rolled his eyes and then turned back to Naruto. "So, you really don't know how to do the leaf-training exercise?"

Naruto's face flushed red. Were they going to make fun of her? "Uh, no I don't," she answered reluctantly.

"Okay," Sasuke answered. "Then we should start training immediately."

"You're not going to make fun of me? Or ask why I never learnt it in the academy?" she couldn't help but ask.

"I wouldn't make fun of you for that, Naru Naru-chan!" Sakura reassured her. Naruto looked unconvinced. "Uh, well, I wouldn't make fun of you for that, anymore," Sakura blushed.

Sasuke merely shook his head. "Making fun of you would waste valuable training time," he explained. Naruto rolled her eyes at his pragmatism.

"Hn," Sasuke ordered Sakura.

"Alright," she agreed. "I'll do the teaching. So, Naru Naru-chan do you know what the point of the leaf-training exercise is?" she asked. Naruto shook her head. "Alright, so you do know the basics of chakra though, right?"

Naruto looked back at her uncomprehendingly. "What's chakra?"

Sakura and Sasuke exchanged glances. How was it even possible to be this dense? "Chakra is the energy you get from mixing together mental energy and physical energy. We use chakra to perform Jutsus," Sakura explained.

"Oh!" Naruto clapped her hands together. "It's the glowy stuff! Why didn't you just say so?" she asked.

Sakura's eyebrow twitched. "Right, the glowy stuff. So this exercise is meant to teach you how to manage your chakra and increase your chakra control. Chakra control is a natural ability every ninja has, some more than others, but if you train well you can increase it. Generally the higher your chakra capacity is, the lower your control will be."

"So what's the point of chakra control? Can you use jutsu better if you have more of it?" Naruto asked.

"Yes. Jutsu are achieved by mixing specific amounts of mental and physical energy together and then channelling that into different forms. For example, the fact that Sasuke-kun can perform a fireball jutsu means that his chakra control and capacity are naturally higher than other ninjas our age. Normally, a student just out of the academy would not have the control necessary to create fire and the jutsu would either fail or explode in their face," Sakura explained.

"Why would it fail if other people from our class tried it? And how do you know Sasuke has high chakra capacity?" Naruto asked.

Sakura sighed and ran her hands through her fringe. It was nice that Naru Naru-chan was paying attention - and more than she'd expected from her, honestly - but she had so many questions! "Jutsu are divided into ranks according to how high the chakra control and chakra capacity needed to perform them is. And how destructive they are. Academy students usually can't perform anything above E Rank but the great fireball is a C Rank jutsu. Usually we learn D ranks while we're genin, and some particularly adept students or clam members might even pick up a C rank or two. The fact that Sasuke-kun can already perform it without specialised training indicates he has more control than normal. And I know he has high chakra capacity because normally using a C rank jutsu that involves an element twice would at least visibly exhaust a newly graduated student and Sasuke-kun didn't show any signs of fatigue after we fought Kakashi-sensei."

"So many words..." Naruto stared at her in awe.

"I don't have to repeat that, do I? You understood, right?" Sakura asked.

"Yeah, I got it. So, so, Sakura-chan, how much chakra control do I have? And how much capacity?" Naruto asked excitedly. "I'm totally awesome, right?"

Sakura frowned. "That isn't really my area of expertise Naru Naru-chan. I'm not a chakra sensor. I guess your solid clone technique should take more chakra than the E ranks we learn at the academy since it's a physical duplicate... How many can you do?" she asked.

Naruto thought about it. "I don't know. When I was practicing the technique I think I made around 300 or so. Oh, and the scroll I learnt it from said it's a B rank, if that means anything." She admitted.

Sakura's eyebrows shot upwards and she exchange a shocked glance with Sasuke.

"Academy students' using a B rank technique so casually, and without getting tired, is not normal," Sasuke contributed. Sakura noticed that his eyebrows had drawn together and his eyes had narrowed slightly. What was that about? It almost looked like he was pissed off for some reason.

"I'm guessing that means you have a huge chakra capacity. Incredibly huge." Sakura told her, choosing to ignore Sasukes' change of expression. For now, anyway.

"Yes!" Naruto cheered. "I'm awesome! I'm awesome!"

"And as for chakra control, I'll tell you when I've seen you perform the leaf-training exercise. This is literally the easiest thing to do involving chakra - even little kids can do it, so no matter how bad you are you should at least partially succeed," Sakura explained.

Sasuke took one of the leaves from Sakura's hand and placed it on top of Naruto's head. "Keep this in place on your head by sticking it to you with chakra." he ordered, taking over his part of the training.

"Alright, I bet I get it in one shot!" Naruto immediately channelled lots and lots of chakra to her head trying to get the leaf to stick. But instead of doing what it was supposed to, the leaf exploded off her head and landed at Sasuke's feet, smoking around the edges.

"I think that's the first time I've ever seen someone... explode the leaf off their head." Sakura commented, staring at the leaf smoking on the grass.

"Heh, moron." Sasuke smirked at her.

"I'll get it next time! I'll definitely get it next time, believe it!" Naruto shouted.

* * *

Five hours later, Kakashi decided that his back was going to cramp if he kept sitting against his stump and reading Icha Icha paradise so he decided to wander off and see how his team was doing. When he got there he saw Naruto gingerly walking around with a backpack stuck to her head and Sakura yelling at her each time it started to wobble.

"What happened to the leaf?" Kakashi asked.

Sakura groaned and turned to face him. "Naruto has really bad chakra control - really really bad! It must be the worst chakra control in history!" she exclaimed.

"I think she's broken a record of suck somewhere," Sasuke contributed.

"Every time she tried, the leaf just flew off her head like she was repelling it. We tried it again and again but I can't tell how much chakra she's using, so I couldn't give her any guidance besides try half of that, try a quarter of that, maybe you should just try a tenth of that etc," she sighed. "So we decided to start off with something heavier, more affected by gravity, and work our way up to a leaf."

Kakashi nodded solemnly. He'd expected Naruto to have increased reserves and low control but this... this was pretty bad.

"Naruto, you can stop now," he ordered Naruto; who was still walking around with the backpack on her head, face screwed up in concentration. Naruto pulled the backpack off her head and slumped bonelessly to the ground. "Why - is - this - so - hard!" she gasped.

Kakashi crooked an eyebrow. She was obviously using way way too much chakra if practicing the simple leaf-training exercise left her so exhausted. "Naruto, do you feel like you've improved at all?" he asked.

Naruto opened her mouth to answer but before she could Sakura beat her to the punch. "Yes, she has. We've been gradually taking things out of the backpack to decrease the load and make it harder for her to affix it to her head. It's taking a while though. I don't think she'll move on to the leaf itself by the end of today, even if she spends every single minute practicing the technique."

It would be better if they had a way to gauge Naruto's chakra as she was performing the technique. "Quick question - can anyone here sense chakra?" Kakashi asked. If there wasn't anyone he'd have to ask Kurenai, but he didn't think she'd take kindly to him interrupting Team 8's training for his own student.

"Only mine, Kakashi-sensei," Sakura replied.

Sasuke shook his head.

Naruto merely looked confused. "What do you mean, Pedo-sensei?"

He was never going to get rid of that moniker, was he? "Every ninja naturally has a sense of their chakra, its quantity and quality and how to control it. Some ninja have a kind of sixth sense, to put it that way, and can tell things about other ninjas by detecting chakra, whether through sight, sound, smell, taste or a vague sense of feel."

"Oh, right. I can do that," Naruto replied.

All three of them looked at Naruto and had the exact same thoughts. _'Why didn't you say that before?_' and _'That ability is wasted on someone so dense.'_

Sakura switched back into teaching mode at the new information. "Naru Naru-chan, if you can sense chakra, it'll help you learn the leaf-training exercise faster. But are you sure you have this ability? Do you have any proof?" Sakura asked carefully.

Naruto rolled her eyes. "I'm not lying, Sakura-chan. Sasuke has depressing grey chakra, you have light green and Pedo-senseis' looks like cat vomit."

Sakura stifled a giggle while Kakashi-sensei and Sasuke scowled at Naruto.

"What about the amount?" Sasuke asked Naruto, looking intense.

"Sakura-chans' is the smallest. Sasuke has more than her. Pedo-sensei has even more and I have 4-5 times as much as him! That means I'm the best, right?" Naruto puffed her chest out proudly.

Kakashi noticed Sasuke frowning deeply to himself at her words. Well, that was pleasant. If things kept going that way he was going to develop a superiority-inferiority complex. "No, Naruto," he disagreed. "We're all better than you because we can actually do the leaf-concentration exercise." he smiled.

At that Sasuke and Sakura started looking very proud of themselves, when Kakashi reminded them "Not that that's a big deal or anything though." He found it amusing when their shoulders drooped again. 12 year olds could be so predictable.

"Right, Sakura, Sasuke if you two could take the other leaves and demonstrate for Naruto here," he gestured. "Naruto, pay attention to how much chakra they use and try to copy it," he instructed.

Naruto watched closely as both Sakura and Sasuke placed the leaves on their heads with little aplomb and then casually strolled around, leaves firmly staying in place.

"Did you get that?" Kakashi asked. "Need another demonstration?"

"I'm good. You'll see, I'll get it down by the time the day is over!" she declared.

"Don't make promises you can't keep...moron," Sasuke cheerfully encouraged. Naruto stuck her tongue out at him.

"You're the moron! As soon as I get here tomorrow morning I'll do it perfectly, and then you're gonna look like a big idiot!"

"Then, Naruto, I'd like you to stay here and try to get the leaf to stick to your head, to the point you can walk around without it falling off by using the same amount of chakra as Sasuke and Sakura did. Sasuke, Sakura, I'm going to take you two on a special excursion to the Hokage tower and elaborate on its many functions and facilities." Kakashi eye-smiled at her and then motioned to the other two to leave with him.

"Oh joy. More '_training'_," Sasuke enthused sarcastically.

"Don't worry, Sasuke-kun. I heard they have a library in the Hokage tower with scrolls on all kinds of Konoha techniques and jutsu," Sakura comforted him.

* * *

Naruto arrived at Training Ground 7 nice and early at 7:30 am. She was still yawning, after staying up quite late trying to master the leaf-training exercise. Sasuke and Sakura weren't there yet so Naruto made her way to a nice looking stump and sprawled against the base. The sun was warm on her face and the temptation to take a brief nap was strong.

But she wasn't going to give that jerk, Sasuke another reason to call her a moron. True, he wasn't being as much of a jerk as usual, but he was still an annoying prick. Naruto was looking forward to taking him down a peg.

Sasuke arrived at the clearing next and greeted her with an almost inaudible 'hn'. At least it was a step up from his squint-and-you-could-call-them-a-nod nods. Taking the stump next to her, he sat down, crossing his arms over his knees and taking in the sun like she was.

Shortly afterwards Sakura-chan arrived and greeted them both with a bright smile. "Hey, Sakura-chan. How was the tour yesterday?" Naruto asked.

"It was the most boring, most useless waste of time that could have been used for training ever," Sasuke complained.

"It wasn't that bad. They have a library on Konoha jutsu and techniques, Vaults to keep things hidden, A storehouse for surplus ninja gear - some which they sell at half price, the missions desks, shinobi mission and training consultants, council meeting rooms, The Hokage's office, accessibility ramps and!"- Sakura tried to add some perspective to the conversation but just ended up getting carried away.

Naruto quickly cut her off before she could catalogue every single feature of the Hokages tower, up to and including the wood panelling and wide windows for fast shinobi entries and exits. "You can show me next time," She grinned at her.

"Right, maybe next time we finish a mission," Sakura easily agreed.

"Hmph. Dorks," Sasuke snorted.

"Yeah, let's see who's laughing the next time you're stuck in the Hokage Tower and can't find the toilets," Naruto snorted. "Even the mighty Uchihas don't have limitless bladders, idiot,"

Against her better will Sakura began to laugh. "Don't worry, Sasuke-kun. I remember where the toilets are, so I can just show you next time," she tried to comfort him.

Sasuke turned away with a scoff. "I know where the toilets are," he lied. And that was the end of that conversation.

"So… todays' mission…" Sakura awkwardly tried to clear the tension.

Out of nowhere Kakashi appeared in front of then, dispersing an ominous amount of smoke. "Did someone say mission?" he asked cheerfully.

Sasuke was so startled he immediately shot to his feet and both Naruto and Sakura let out high pitched screams.

"Pedo-sensei, what are you trying to do, give us a heart attack?!" Naruto yelled at him.

Kakashi deflated and despondently started walking away from them. "Well I just came here to deliver our next mission, but if you're going to be like that..." he trailed off.

Sasuke appeared in front of him with startling speed, pointing a kunai directly at the pocket where he knew Kakashi liked to keep his Icha Icha. Kakashi hastily covered his pocket with his hands and gave the kunai a wary look.

"Stop," Sasuke ordered. "We want the...mission?" Something seemed to occur to him and he glared suspiciously at Kakashi. "Is this a real mission, this time?" he asked.

Kakashi melodramatically raised both his eyebrows, even though he knew the gesture would be lost under the folds of his mask. "Sasuke, you wound me! I hand-picked this mission for all of you after witnessing your impressive teaching skills yesterday!"

As an aside he looked at Sakura and added, "Seriously, you should consider a career in teaching."

While Sakura blushed at the praise, Sasuke eagerly – for Sasuke - took the scroll and unwound it.

"Carrying hot water to a hot spa because they're having issues with their plumbing, is a mission you hand-picked for us?" Sasuke dryly asked.

"Yes!" Kakashi answered. "I know you're a teenage boy, raging hormones and all, so I decided to help you out! You can carry all the water by yourself and the girls can admire your biceps from a safe distance!"

Naruto, as usual, completely missed the point. "Pedo-sensei, I'm sure I have much bigger biceps than Sasuke! I can carry twice as much as he can, believe it!"

Sakura frowned. "I wouldn't be doing a good job at becoming a better shinobi if I let Sasuke-kun do all the hard labour," she disagreed.

Sasuke merely waved his kunai menacingly at the direction of Kakashis Icha Icha Paradise, hidden away behind his hands.

A bead of sweat materialised at Kakashis' brow and rolled down, disappearing into the folds of his mask. "Ahaha... I was joking, you guys. Seriously."

_'There is something wrong with my students and their lack of hormones.'_ he privately thought to himself.

* * *

When they finally finished their mission, they were all soaked to varying degrees. Sakura was absolutely drenched, she'd had the most trouble carrying the pails of water and it showed. Sasuke was only a little damp since he'd only gotten splashed when collecting and depositing the water and if Sakura had dropped any nearby. Naruto had been running around like a demented chipmunk, trying to carry more than Sasuke so obviously she ended up completely soaking. Then, halfway through the mission she had a brainwave and sent a clone back home to bring her a raincoat. After that, she stayed completely dry.

"Another great job, guys," Kakashi smiled. "The owner was so pleased with the help they gave us all a ticket for one trip to the spa!"

Naruto and Sakura both looked excited when they collected their tickets but Sasuke merely glanced at his before putting it in his pocket.

"And here's a tally for all of you!: Naruto - 5 points for having the foresight to use a raincoat, Sasuke - 6 points for spilling the least water and working the most efficiently and Sakura - 3 points for trying your best and persevering!"

_'Mine is kind of lame,'_ thought Sakura.

"What are the points for?" Sasuke asked.

"I'm glad you asked, Sasuke! Based on your performance in every mission and training session I've decided to award you all points. At the end of the month, the ninja with the most points will be '_The ninja of the month_!' Whoever wins ninja of the month, wins some specialised training that I will personally arrange for them!"

_'Oooooh, Trainiiing!_' Naruto thought.

_'If I win ninja of the month and get the training, it'll help me protect Sasuke-kun!_' Sakura thought.

_'I have to win,'_ thought Sasuke.

"Awesome, right? By the way, I won't tell you the point tallies but Naruto got the most mission points yesterday and Sakura got the most training points yesterday for being such a good sport and teaching Naruto so well! Currently, Sasuke is in the lead."

At this Sasuke smirked.

"By one point."

He stopped smirking.

"Now let's go do a bit of pre-lunch training, and then we can all get together and have our first lunch as a team," Kakashi smiled.

Naruto ran ahead of them to the clearing and then waited impatiently for the rest of them to arrive. "Pedo-sensei, look at this!" she shouted. She had a leaf in her hand. Placing the leaf on her head the same way as Sakura and Sasuke had, she channelled the same amount of chakra they had demonstrated before and got it to stick. Then she walked around, laughed, started running, scaled a tree, jumped down and did a few cartwheels. All with the leaf stuck to her head.

_'Show off,'_ thought Sasuke.

"Good job, Naruto! I didn't expect you'd grasp this technique so fast!" Kakashi complemented her. "That's fifteen points for learning the technique in one day!"

Naruto flushed proudly. She didn't bother telling him that she had stayed up till 4am trying to master it.

"And also, minus ten points for not already learning the technique in the academy," Kakashi added.

Naruto pouted. _'Mean!'_ she thought. She turned to smirk at Sasuke all the same. Now, who looked like an idiot? To her annoyance he appeared to be too busy cataloguing his kunai to pay any attention to her. Jerk.

"Since Naruto has mastered the first stage of the leaf-concentration training, we will be moving on to the next stage!" he declared. "Naruto, take your leaf and affix it to the middle of your stomach, Sakura, you take yours and affix it to your shoulder, and Sasuke-" he smirked.

Sasuke had a bad feeling about this.

"Affix your leaf to your right buttock." he ordered. Naruto immediately started sniggering.

"I will not do that!" he protested. "Sakura, tell him that's a stupid idea!" he turned to the only other somewhat normal member of his team for help, but to his shame she had started sniggering herself. For someone who was supposed to be on his side she didn't seem to have any reservations laughing at him…

"S-sorry, Sasuke-kun! I'm not usually this immature but I!-" he couldn't hear the rest of her apology through the heavy laughs she was trying to smother.

Since that avenue of aid was cut off, he simply did what he did best.

"Sheesh, stop giving me the stink-eye already. It's not really helping my opinion on your maturity," Kakashi rolled his eyes. "Humour aside, there's actually a point to all this. The stomach is nearest to the majority of the chakra reservoir, so it requires far less chakra to attach the leaf. The shoulder has less than the head which is the nerve centre for the chakra coils, and the buttocks, as the biggest muscle in the body also have a large amount of chakra, requiring less for the leaf. Mastering affixing the leaf in different locations will teach you about variances in chakra and help you determine the amounts you're using. Without this crucial second stage, all that you will learn from the leaf-concentration exercise will be to maintain a steady flow of chakra in one spot. Which is usually far from helpful in a shinobi battle." he explained.

Immediately, they all took their leaves and affixed them to their respective body parts, Sasuke, very reluctantly so. Only Sakuras' managed to stick.

"Good job, Sakura. You must have naturally high chakra control," Kakashi complimented and Sakura flushed again.

"So, what we will be doing is this. While sparring, I want you all to split your concentration and have the leaf sticking perfectly to you while we spar. I will be rotating battles between the three of you while the other two fight, correcting any imbalances, any use of incorrect stance and gauging your grasp on basic Taijutsu. After you master keeping the leaf affixed in your described location, you will move on to a new location. This will happen ten times and by that time, you will have mastered the second stage of the leaf-training exercise and be able to affix the leaf to any part of your body. The conditions for the exercise are this: Use only Taijutsu to spar, and every time your leaf detaches itself, you must disengage from the spar and do ten push-ups. Before each sparring match, you will be given ten minutes to practice affixing your leaf and... Oh, this speech has already taken up two minutes! You better get started!"

Kakashi smiled and walked back over to his stump to read for the remaining eight minutes. His three cute students all looked at him incredulously.

"That's unfair! He's just being a huge jerk!" Naruto complained.

"Kakashi-sensei, my ass. More like Jerkass-sensei." Sakura grumbled. Ironically, she didn't even seem to have any need to practice as her leaf was sticking to her just fine.

"Hn," Sasuke agreed, as his leaf just slid off his shorts - again.

"Huh, did someone say something about asses?" Kakashi looked up from his orange covered book.

"No!" Sakura, Sasuke and Naruto all glared at him.

_'They're so sensitive at that age,'_ Kakashi thought to himself with a not insignificant amount of amusement.

* * *

Sakura gasped, flopping down on the ground as Kakashi concluded his spar with her.

Kakashi turned to look at her. "Taijutsu, perfect textbook form but otherwise..."

Sakura blushed. She already knew what he was going to say next.

"Sakura, you're strong."

Huh? Sakura looked at him in surprise. _'Did he just say what I thought he said?'_

"You are strong. Even our mission earlier today, at the beginning I have no doubt you could have carried five pails at the same time if it was possible to do so. At the end, you could barely carry half a pail."

Sakura flushed in embarrassment. "I wasn't trying to slack off or anything-"

Kakashi smiled at her. "I know that. I gave you points for working hard, remember?"

_'Lamest thing to be awarded for ever,'_ Sakura thought.

"The problem is you have naturally low stamina. You're very quick to fatigue - I wonder... Did you ever get sick as a kid?" he asked.

Sakura nodded. "All the time Kakashi-sensei. I have a lot of allergies that my family only really found out about in hindsight… and I was always getting really bad hay fever. Why?" she asked curiously.

"Basically your body spent more time healing itself than other kids who were out, running around and gradually building muscles and stamina busy being active. All your time spent indoors didn't really work out in your favour," he explained.

"Well...that sucks," Sakura commented.

"Yeah," Kakashi sighed. "The diet that your records mentioned probably didn't help with the whole youthful energy thing, either."

_'Oh god, I sound like Gai,'_ he thought.

"I think we're going to have to get you some specialised help to get you back up to genin level standards. When we finish training today, I'll take you to see a nutrition specialist in the Hokage tower, since I don't think merely dropping your diet is going to work. I'll organise a joint training session with a Taijutsu specialist I know, and if he agrees he can get you started on wearing body weights which will gradually increase your stamina. I'll also see about getting a training schedule set up for you, with exercises you can do to build up your body in our off time. "

Kakashi leaned over and ruffled Sakura's hair, "Sakura, you are strong. It's just a disadvantage, so you don't have to look so dismayed. Naruto and Sasuke have their disadvantages too."

"Really, Sensei?"

"Really."

* * *

_'My arms are starting to hurt.'_ thought Naruto.

Pairing her and Sasuke up had to be the worst idea ever, because both of them kept dropping their leaf and interrupting their spar for push-ups. They were both starting to see some progress, they could partially attach them now, but any particularly energetic sparring and they just fell off again.

"Hey, Sasuke! Feeling tired yet?" Naruto taunted.

Sasuke had taken to fixing his leaf to him while he did the push-ups now and seeing how far he could go.

"If anyone's tired, it's you, moron," Sasuke retorted.

Naruto did a few more push ups and sighed. The push-ups weren't going to help her master the leaf-training exercise stage two.

"Oy, Pedo-sensei! Can I switch to sit-ups instead?" she yelled.

Kakashi yelled back an affirmation and Naruto changed position and stuck the leaf to her stomach. Then she turned her head and smirked at Sasuke. The silent challenge was clear.

_'Now we're on equal ground.'_

Annoyed that Naruto was ripping off his idea and that now she would probably improve at the same rate as him, Sasuke began performing his push-ups faster. _'I'll finish first and prove my superiority,'_ he thought.

Naruto glared at him and started doing her sit-ups faster too.

They finished at the same time.

"Time to spar, Sasuke-chan," Naruto invited, cracking her knuckles threateningly.

"Hn," Sasuke glowered. '_You won't know what's hit you, bitch.'_

As one they jumped towards each other and started an all-out brawl. Naruto was fast but Sasuke was faster. She was agile though and easily changed positions and moves according to the situation. This brawl was shaping up to be pretty challenging.

Naruto grinned fiercely at him when she caught him around the neck but Sasuke merely head butted her hard enough to draw blood - if it wasn't for the forehead protector that is.

_'Owwww,'_ thought Sasuke.

Naruto was back on her feet immediately and attempting to side-kick him into submission. Sasuke drew back, planning to circle around her and attack from her unprotected side.

* * *

"Morons," sighed Kakashi looking at both of them.

Reluctantly he got up and made his way over to the two of them. He grabbed them by their collars and pulled them away from each other and up into the air.

"I said _'spar_', not start a bar fight." he reminded them.

"He started it!" Naruto yelled. She glared venomously at Sasuke and he glared back.

"Oh, stop it. You're both idiots. Where are your leaves?" Naruto and Sasuke looked at each other. They'd forgotten about the leaves.

Sakura walked over with the leaves in her palm. They were dirty and one of them had blood on it. "I found them over there, sensei," she said, pointing to a spot a considerable distance away.

"Really." Kakashi gave both his obnoxious genin an exasperated look. "For today's training session, Sakura gets 20 points for _'doing as she was told_,'' he stressed.

He looked at both of them to drive the point home and saw something that gave him pause. "Why do I see bite-marks? Who was biting?" he sighed in exasperation.

Naruto and Sasuke both looked away from him, refusing to answer.

Well, if they were going to be like that... "Sorry, Sakura but it looks like you have competition. Naruto and Sasuke have already been exchanging love bites, it seems."

Sakura blushed and gave Naruto a look of betrayal. Naruto immediately started panicking. "Th-that's not what it was, Sakura-chan! I was just trying to bite off his finger, I swear!"

"Kinky," commented Kakashi.

"You," Naruto gave him a flat look. "Are such an ass."

"So it was YOU!" Kakashi suddenly roared, taking all of them by surprise. "What type of Taijutsu is biting?! Is that a new technique? Both of you are idiots!"

Naruto and Sasuke both finally started to look a little bit ashamed.

"I don't mind healthy rivalries, but being competitive to the point that you forget about your original objective is... not even a ninja at the academy would be so stupid. When I meet you tomorrow I expect 5000 lines on the importance of teamwork_ - 'a lesson I thought you already understood! - _from the both of you and for now we will be switching over our combatants. Sakura you take Naruto, and Sasuke you're with me." Kakashi finished angrily and dropped Naruto, walking away, still carrying Sasuke by the collar.

"I've never seen Pedo-sensei get so angry before," Naruto stared, eyes open wide.

"You're ridiculous," Sakura sighed. "I at least thought Sasuke would have some sense but no, biting each other was more important!" Sakura glared at her.

"You're never going to let that go, are you?" Naruto asked fearfully.

In answer, Sakura gave her a wide pleasant smile. "Naruto, let's spar."

_'Uh, I have a bad feeling about this...'_ thought Naruto.

* * *

Five spars later it was lunchtime.

Kakashi rounded up all three of them and got ready to enter lecture mode. "I was going to take you all out for lunch but that was before Naruto and Sasuke started acting like such morons." he glared at them. Their idiocy seemed to have finally sunk in, because they both flushed and looked away.

He sighed heavily. "I know that you kids are all 12 year olds and I don't expect you to start acting like adults anytime soon. But a ninja has to be more mature, more intelligent and more capable. A ninja 12 year old doesn't get to live like a normal 12 year old. We have responsibilities, duties. People's lives hang in the balance whenever we feel like doing our day job."

Kakashi pointed to a stone monument in the clearing across from them. "Do you see that stone?"

They were all too busy listening to his words in rapt attention to answer. "On that monument are the names of some of the greatest heroes of the leaf village. On that monument"- he paused for emphasis - "are the names of the heroes with which we would not be alive today, heroes that gave their lives in battle so that Konoha could continue to prosper. And on that monument... are the names of my former teammates and jounin sensei."

"As ninja you have to know that completing the mission is tantamount to everything else. They say that in your textbooks, right?" he asked Sakura.

"Yes, Kakashi-sensei," Sakura replied, sounding unusually subdued.

"That's wrong. A ninja who abandons the mission is trash. But even more important, is the fact, that if a ninja ever abandons his comrade, he is worse than trash. Because I failed to understand these principles, I disrespected my father's sacrifice and even worse... I lost my best friend." Kakashi had to pause and gather up his courage before he could continue. Would they see him differently after this? But it had to be said.

So he told them about his father and about Obito, though he left out the details regarding his Sharingan eye. He'd tell Sasuke a little later, when he'd matured a bit more. "I want all of you to cherish each other, but more important than that is you. Each of you. What you need. You need your teammates, to cover your deficiencies, to complement your strengths, to have your back so that you can concentrate on battle without worrying about a stray kunai slicing through you. I don't mind if you have rivalries, if you tease each other, you can even dislike each other, but the minute you lose sight of your goals and lose your teamwork it's over. And it's that minute, just one minute, in the middle of battle that someone can die. From now on, I don't want to see any of you compromise your teamwork because of your pride, your ego or any other reason ever again," he glared at them.

"I'm sorry Kakashi-sensei. ...and Sasuke, I'm sorry too," Naruto quietly mumbled.

Sasuke couldn't quite overcome his pride to say sorry so instead he shook her hand. Kakashi didn't protest - that was probably the closest the Uchiha heir could get to an apology for now.

Sakura nodded her head. "I won't forget, Kakashi-sensei." she told him, and by her tone of voice he knew she wouldn't.

"Alright, as long as you remember," he sighed. Bringing up old wounds like that had affected him more than he was willing to show. "Because of Naruto and Sasuke, no one else gets lunch. This is a punishment, but it's also a form of training. In the future there will be many times when you will be unable to fully rest or sate yourself. It's good if you can get used to the feeling of fighting at less than 100% early on, so that you become accustomed to it and draw out more strength in battle. Sakura, you didn't do anything wrong but since this is also a form of training you shouldn't skip it. For you especially, this is important training. Naruto, Sasuke, I suggest you apologize to your teammate." he hinted.

"Sorry Sakura-chan," Naruto apologized shamefacedly.

"I-I regret the imposition of this restraint upon you," Sasuke offered. He still couldn't bring himself to say sorry.

"Uh, it's okay," Sakura replied, eyes wide. "Like Kakashi-sensei said, this training will benefit me too."

"Now that that's taken care of, the three of you will now all spar against each other at the same time. Handling battles with multiple opponents is also an important shinobi skill, though at the academy your battles are usually fought one on one. I will be observing from a distance so I don't distract you. Taijutsu only, no biting or scratching." he joked. Sasuke and Naruto still looked uncomfortable.

Kakashi returned to his stump and pulled his book back out again. Though his speech had had a profound effect on his students, they still lost respect for him at that moment.

"Is he really going to observe?" Naruto muttered.

"Congratulations on passing the second stage of the leaf-training exercise!" Kakashi congratulated his panting students.

"I never want to see another leaf again," Sasuke complained. Naruto and Sakura rapidly nodded their agreement.

"Was it _that_ bad?" Kakashi asked them in mock surprise.

"You know it was!" Naruto yelled. "Having us spar each other was fine but then you made us all battle you and you kicked our asses!" she shouted.

Sasuke and Sakura glared at him.

"I just didn't want any of you getting the mistaken idea that by teaming up you could defeat a jounin," he chuckled.

His words did not help matters. If anything, their glaring intensified.

"Anyway, I'll let all of you take a short break and then we'll move on to the third stage of the leaf-training exercise!" Kakashi cheerfully announced.

Sakura almost broke into tears. "There's _more_?!"

"Oh, great. I'm gonna be able to stick leaves to my butt so well by the end of this day," Sasuke flatly expressed.

"Woooooo…oooooo! More leaves!" Even Naruto's horrible attempt at her usual optimism couldn't save the gloomy atmosphere.

_'I love my job,' _Kakashi smirked.

* * *

**SHINOBI DICTIONARY**

**Kakashis' bento box: **It's really good! And it's homemade too! Hey, you don't think Kakashi could have…

**Haruno clan symbol: **Surprisingly, this is canon. It`s just a hollow circle with a solid circle inside it, as seen on the bottom of her dress pre-timeskip.

**Naruto you're offensive:** Orange is a shitty colour for a ninja and you have terrible taste. Ino should give you a makeover.

**Leaf-Training Exercise: **A simple technique taught to Academy students in which they affix a leaf to their head through the use of chakra. Theoretically mastering this technique increases chakra reserves and chakra control. In canon Naruto never bothered to learn it…

Why am I not surprised?

**Why would chakra-sensor abilities be wasted on Naruto?** Naruto has a short-attention span and does not do well at more institutional methods of learning. In the hands of someone like Sakura, this ability could be used to observe chakra flow and accurately predict enemies movements, to come up with a matching chakra-negating technique or even to learn techniques from other hidden villages. In the hands of someone like Naruto, the most that can be done is tracking, detecting genjutsu and observing chakra flow. Jeez, what a waste!

**What's the importance of chakra colours?** They signify general mood and personality. Sakura, who is normally the team mediator, the _normal _one, and generally in a pleasant mood has pretty light green chakra. Sasuke who broods all the time over revenge has grey, constantly moving chakra, reminiscent of a storm. Kakashi, who beats himself up over things he can't do anything about has multi-coloured chakra reminiscent of cat vomit, signifying his constant turmoil. Generally the uglier your personality, mental state or mood is, the uglier your chakra is. Naruto, as per canon has yellow chakra. I'll let you decide what that means. (For now)

**Ninja of the Month: **An interesting competition?! What could this mean?! Who will win?! What is the prize?! Will Kakashi play favourites?!

* * *

END OF CHAPTER THREE


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter Four: This sensation… No, it can't be!

* * *

**A/N: Don't read this chapter if for whatever reasons you have an… apron related trauma. Or a fetish – I don't want you getting too excited, nosebleeds can be lethal apparently.**

**A/N: Thoughts – italicised and single quoted**

**Dialogue – double quoted**

**Emphasis in dialogue – single quotes or italics or both for extra flavour!**

**Inner Sakura – single quotes, italics and underlined.**

**A/N: Please review and fill the review hole in my heart.**

* * *

"And then he made us do the leaf concentration exercise while he spammed us with killing intent! Lots of killing intent!" Naruto complained.

Hinata stared at her friend in confusion. This was justified because her sensei wasn't a douchebag who routinely subjected three twelve year olds to killing intent. "Uh...that's nice?" she said.

Naruto looked at her flatly. "Yeah, whatever. And then he told us we had to keep a leaf stuck to us for the rest of the day, while we ate, while we showered, even when we went to sleep!"

Hinata noticed, at this point that there was a leaf on Naruto's cheek. "Is that...?" she trailed off.

Naruto sighed. "Yes. Yes, it is."

Hinata didn't really know what to do so she awkwardly patted her friend on the shoulder. "If it helps you feel any better, yesterday Kurenai-sensei went over our strengths and how we should work together as a team."

"Why would that make me feel any better?" Naruto grumpily asked.

"Because she spent a lot more time listing our weaknesses," Hinata sighed. "And I have a lot of weaknesses."

"What?! No, you don't, you're totally strong! You could kick my ass in ten different ways without even trying!" Naruto protested.

"That's not what Neji-niisan would say."

"Neji..." Naruto awkwardly scratched the back of her head, "is not always right."

Hinata giggled. "I never thought you'd say something like that, Naruto-chan," she teased.

A panicked look suddenly blossomed on Naruto's face as she just realised what she had said. "Don't tell him I said that, Hinata-chan!" Naruto pleaded.

"Why? Who knows... it might just impress him," Hinata suggested.

Naruto glared at her.

"Oh, alright, you drama queen. I won't tell him. Happy now?"

"Yes!" Naruto grinned. "But I have to get going now or I'll miss practice! Thanks for meeting up with me Hinata-chan!"

Hinata smiled at her. "Thank you for meeting me so early in the morning Naruto-chan. Let's arrange another time to catch up, okay?"

"You got it!" Naruto was half out the door. "Bye, Hinata-chan!"

Hinata smiled to herself. _'That girl... she never changes.'_

* * *

Naruto arrived at the usual place to see that, as expected, Sakura and Sasuke had arrived before her.

"Sorry! I was having breakfast with a friend and sort-of lost track of the time!" she apologised.

"Who cares. At least you didn't come an hour late... like some people," Sakura grimaced.

"It's your fault for not coming prepared," Sasuke chastised Sakura, holding up a few playing cards, with a game set up in front of him.

"But Sasuke-kun, playing cards are more fun when you're playing with other people! Now that Naru Naru–chan is here, we can play together to improve our team comraderie!"

Naruto and Sasuke looked at each other dubiously "Whatever. Then, you're the dealer," Sasuke ordered Sakura.

At the revelation that she was going to be playing against Sasuke, Naruto started glaring at him. Sasuke started glaring back.

Sakura promptly whacked them both on the head and Sasuke gave her a betrayed look.

Sakura rolled her eyes at him. "Sasuke, I love you and I think you're the best male ninja ever but sometimes I seriously wonder about your intelligence. Do you really think getting all competitive with Naruto, after Kakashi-sensei just explicitly warned us not to fight each other, is a good idea?"

Sasuke looked slightly hurt – which for him, meant his lower lip twitched slightly. "I wasn't being competitive with her!" he complained.

"Yeah! We were… bonding. We were just bonding!" Naruto yelled, rubbing her sore head and glaring at Sakura.

"But... you were glaring at each other!"

"That's how rivals bond. By staring into each other's eyes for long periods of time," Sasuke explained.

"Pedo-sensei told us not to fight! But he said having a rivalry is healthy! What, you got a problem or something, Sakura-chan?" Naruto yelled.

"Uh...no. As long as your rivalry doesn't turn into mutual sexual attraction, I guess," Sakura replied, still feeling a little bewildered.

'_It's totally obvious you're lying though…_' she thought to herself.

Naruto and Sasuke both made faces at her.

"Yuck, Sakura-chan! I don't like boys with dark eyes!" Naruto complained.

"I don't like girls who hit me on the head and refuse to deal the cards," Sasuke said, glaring pointedly at Sakura.

"Okay, okay! I'll deal the cards already, so don't be so impatient!" Sakura snuck a glance at Sasuke out the corner of her eye. He was just joking... right?

* * *

When Kakashi finally arrived, just half an hour later, he was pleasantly surprised to see his three cute students somewhat getting along and enjoying a card game. "What a cosy little scene," he remarked casually, shunshinning behind Naruto.

Naruto let out a strangled scream and hastily stood up, as the other two just looked shocked. _'I didn't hear him coming at all,'_ she thought.

Kakashi beamed at all of them. "Great job, you guys! All your leaves are still sticking, even Sakuras'!"

Sakura looked at him in confusion. "Why wouldn't mine stick? Didn't you say I have high chakra-control, Kakashi-sensei?"

"Your capacity is slightly below average according to your academy data. I thought you might not make It." he explained.

"Actually... I am somewhat low on chakra right now," Sakura admitted. "But my leaf didn't fall of my forehead once!"

"Then, since you're low on chakra..." Kakashi paused thoughtfully, "this time I'll teach you guys about chakra transference! Chakra transference is a valuable technique that can be used on the field to partially refresh a comrade with low chakra. This technique requires physical contact so, Sasuke, Naruto, Sakura, if you could all hold one of your teammates hands..."

Sakura grabbed both the hands of Sasuke and Naruto and smiled pleasantly.

_'Yes! I get to hold Sasuke-kun's hand!_' Sakura thought.

"Now form a straight line." Kakashi ordered. He waited for his students to comply, then continued, reaching over and grasping Sasuke's hand. "All of you shape your chakra outside your bodies and reach out."

When they had all done so, Kakashi projected his own chakra out wards and connected it with Sasuke's. "Sasuke, I want you to pay attention to what I'm going to do. First, I'm going to siphon off your chakra to join my own. This requires the permission of the other party, so when you feel a slight draining sensation don't resist. I will give your chakra back. After I perform this technique, I want you to perform it on Sakura, Sakura you follow on Naruto and Naruto you can try on me. This technique does not actually use any chakra, so once you've felt the effects, all of you will be able to replicate it perfectly - even Naruto who has low chakra control."

Naruto waited her turn and it seemed like it was taking forever because everyone else had to go first. Finally Sakura-chan latched on to her chakra, taking some for herself. It was a strange feeling, a sense of somehow getting lighter, of losing something she hadn't known she had. Naruto waited patiently till Sakura finished, which didn't take very long and moved on to Kakashi. Now it was her turn to reach out for his chakra and grab onto it.

"Um, Pedo-sensei, are we supposed to just sense the chakra or actually feel it?" Naruto asked.

"You should just vaguely have a sense of chakra. It should feel familiar to you as you are used to shaping and using your own chakra by now, but also foreign."

'Oh.' Naruto grimaced. Pedo-senseis' chakra did not feel nice. It felt warm in an unpleasant sort of way and... squishy, malleable, whatever. It felt pretty horrible actually, but then again, what could you expect of chakra that looked like cat vomit?

"Your chakra feels kind of sick, Pedo-sensei. Like actually being sick," Naruto complained.

Kakashi smiled apologetically at her. "Sorry about that, Naruto. Kurenai says almost the same thing but I can't really help it. As a chakra sensor, your abilities are probably enhancing your perception of chakra."

"Yeah," Naruto frowned. "I can sense your chakra floating around near the edges. My chakra doesn't like it."

"And that brings me to my next point! This technique is only to be used in times of emergencies or if the siphoned chakra is intended to be completely used in a short amount of time. The body's natural chakra systems will detect the foreign chakra presence and object to it. In that amount of time, your metabolism will be too busy trying to expel the foreign chakra to produce adrenaline, start cell regrowth or assist other body processes," Kakashi warned. "This form of chakra transference has a name, _Chakra siphon_. It is used as a basis for some other techniques, ones that can only be performed by highly skilled and capable shinobi. Here are different forms of this, for example using another ninja as an amplifier to make a technique much much stronger, by having them lend you the chakra while you shape it. All of these techniques require training and should not be attempted by genin, even particularly skilled genin," he stressed.*

_'So why mention them?'_ thought Naruto.

Sakura, in direct contrast to Naruto was looking very interested in the whole subject. "What about the amplification technique, sensei? Isn't that just like maintaining the standard technique while you perform jutsu?"

"Yes and no, Sakura. If your ally has a considerably large amount of chakra you run the risk of their chakra suffocating your own and inducing chakra death. If you trust the wrong person, they may do this deliberately. In addition if the two chakras are not kept separate from each other, you can accidentally end up poisoning yourself through chakra contamination. As a side note, some shinobi have very efficient chakra coils that automatically convert and assimilate foreign chakra into their own." Kakashi explained.

"I don't think I can do that," Naruto remarked, very conscious of the foreign chakra in her system.

"I don't think I can either, sensei. My chakra feels a little unbalanced." Sakura said.

"Hn," Sasuke commented. Though only Sakura knew what that meant (or did she?), it was apparent from his scowling expression that he also felt the effects of the foreign chakra presence.

"I expected as much. For the record, I can't assimilate chakra either," Kakashi informed them. Sasuke looked noticeably pleased by this. Silly kid. "Now I want you all to move back and give back the chakra you took. This technique is called the _Reverse Chakra Siphon_ and it follows the same procedure as the last technique, except instead of siphoning off someone else's chakra, in this case you outwardly expel your own for them to assimilate. First I will perform this technique on Sasuke and you will continue as we did last time."

Again Naruto waited impatiently for her turn so that she could get rid of the nauseating presence on her periphery. '_Does all chakra feel this horrible?_' She wondered.

Finally it was Sakura's turn, and this time Naruto felt like a part of her that she had lost came back. It was about as satisfying a feeling as a successful trip to the hairdressers. Eagerly she grabbed Kakashis hand and sent his horrible chakra back where it came from. Pedo-sensei could be sort of nice, and he was a good teacher, but she couldn't put it nicer - his chakra felt disgusting.

"Good," Kakashi smiled at them. "Now, I want you to all take turns and reaching out with your chakra, get a feel for your teammate's chakra. No siphoning is necessary this time."

Naruto wandered over to Sasuke while Sakura approached Kakashi. Reluctantly she took Sasuke's hand, hoping that his chakra wouldn't feel the same as Pedo-senseis'. She reached out with her chakra and trying to get a feel for Sasuke's, extended it out towards him. What she encountered was cold, almost impossibly pure refined chakra. It felt - well this didn't make sense, but it felt like silence. Like the eye of a storm.

"Yours doesn't feel as bad," Naruto remarked. "It's still horribly depressing, like your chakra colour but it's not as..." Naruto trailed off. Actually it did feel pretty terrible, just in a less disturbing way. More of a bone chilling way as opposed to a sluggish, slimy vaguely organic feeling. It felt kind of dangerous actually… She stared at Sasuke.

"What?" Sasuke asked irritably.

"U-um, never mind," she knew it wasn't Sasuke or Kakashis' fault they had horrible chakra but she still felt like drawing back from him. Trying to smother the feeling, she grinned brightly at Sasuke, "You done too?"

When he nodded an affirmative 'hn', she moved away - perhaps a bit faster than necessary, and walked over to Sakura. "Ready now?" she asked and Sakura smiled and took her hand. Naruto once again felt that odd sensation of wanting to back away. She didn't want to feel any more horrible, disturbing chakra. She really hoped all chakra didn't feel like that.

Tentatively she reached for Sakura's chakra and the surprise must have shown on her face, because Sakura immediately asked her if anything was wrong. Naruto smiled a sunny smile at her and shook her head. She was pleased to find that Sakura had nice chakra, pleasant and calming. In contrast to her other teammates, Sakura's chakra literally felt like a gentle breeze. Naruto let out a breath she hadn't even known she was holding.

_'So then it's just Sasuke and Pedo-sensei,'_ she realised. Stubbornly, she tried to avoid thinking that their chakra felt horrible because they were horrible people or something was wrong with them. Everyone had different kinds of chakra, it wasn't their fault.

Kakashi motioned for them all to regroup and noticed Naruto was standing a little further away from him and Sasuke than usual_. 'What's that about? Did something about my chakra and Sasuke's, and not Sakura's disturb her?'_ He wondered.

Maybe he should see about getting her to talk to Kurenai. Kurenai was very good at molding chakra, and due to serving as a chakra battery on a lot of tough missions she'd come into contact with a lot of different chakras. She was also a chakra sensor and just like Naruto had complained about the way his chakra had felt. He'd never really paid attention then, but if Naruto was going through the same thing...

"You're all done?" Kakashi asked. When he got two yes's and one 'hn' he continued. "Alright, today we'll be doing two missions instead of one. We'll have a break for training between the two."

Sasuke pouted at him. Well, actually, he only slightly raised his upper lip but that was as close to pouting as Sasuke was ever going to get. "Why do we have to do two '_missions_?' Why can't we just train?" he asked.

"Because today I will be teaching you a new technique and I don't want any of you overdoing it," Kakashi explained with a smile.

"New technique, new technique!" Naruto cheered.

Sasuke and Sakura who had longer attention spans merely looked at him suspiciously. They had not been impressed with learning the leaf-training exercise right off the bat.

"A technique you don't know yet. A useful technique," Kakashi stressed. At this they both looked noticeably happier.

"Now here," he threw a mission scroll at Sasuke. "I took the liberty of already picking this up so you three should all go and do your mission and give your sensei some private reading time," he wandered over to his stump and opened up his book.

"Are you serious? It's only a ten minute walk to the Hokage tower!" Naruto complained.

"What made you think I walked? It barely took three minutes," Kakashi corrected. His three adorable genin looked at him with expressions of confusion and bewilderment. How he wished he had his camera... "Sakura, you're in charge."

* * *

"Swish, swish, swish - swishy swish swish splash!"

Sakura and Sasuke both looked at Naruto who hadn't stopped singing ever since she started painting the wall. Some of the blue paint had gotten on her nose but she was cheerfully painting the wall with both her hands, punctuating every stroke with another nonsensical word. Coverage was surprisingly even, considering.

Sakura ignored her eccentric teammate and turned back to her portion of the wall. She was painting very carefully, trying to avoid gaps, visible brushstrokes and achieve a perfect coverage. Unsurprisingly she had painted the least area of the three of them. "Swishy swishy swish swish... Swish," She started singing without realising it.

"Hn hn hn..." Without meaning to, Sasuke started humming along. It did seem to make the work go faster...

'_Is Sasuke-kun humming?'_ Sakura decided not to say anything and save him the embarrassment.

Wait! What was he doing?! He abruptly stopped humming as he snapped back to his senses. At least he hadn't been singing...

"Swishy swish splash splash bubbles!" Meanwhile Naruto was completely oblivious to the work of her teammates.

* * *

Kakashis one visible eyebrow rose as they strolled into the clearing. "You guys already finished?" he asked in surprise.

"Yep!" Sakura beamed. "Even though Naru Naru-chan and Sasuke-kun got into a fight again, we worked together pretty fast!"

Kakashi looked at Naruto and Sasuke wondering what he was going to do with them. "It wasn't a fight, it was..." evidently Naruto hadn't planned an excuse ahead of time. Kakashi noticed that one entire side of her face was blue, as if someone had tried to use her face as a paintbrush...

"Bonding. We were bonding as teammates," Sasuke finished deadpan. His entire face was covered in blue handprints. Coincidentally, Naruto's hands were covered in blue paint. Right, that wasn't suspicious at all.

But they were smirking at each other, in more of an amused way than a challenging way so he decided to let it go. And Naruto was keeping less of a distance from him and Sasuke so... If that was how they wanted to display their affection, who was he to interfere? As long as they didn't start fighting again.

"Great job!" he congratulated them. "Unfortunately, you finished too early and I don't have anything planned. Go to the Hokage tower and do another mission."

Instantly the pleased expressions on their faces were replaced with mutinous rebellion.

* * *

"We should all secretly learn awesome techniques and beat him up!" Naruto declared.

"He's a jounin, Naru Naru-chan. We wouldn't stand a chance," Sakura shook her head sadly. Sasuke grunted in agreement (?), looking more than a little ticked off himself.

Sakura hoisted a crate of the fish onto her shoulder and waited for her teammates to join. "Fresh fish stinks!" she wrinkled her nose.

"You're the one who accepted this mission," Sasuke reminded her.

"I chose this one so we could finish in time for our training! I don't want to miss out because our Jerkass-sensei is being a Jerkass-sensei again!" she defended herself.

"Come on guys, get a move on!" Naruto was already halfway down the pier and had turned back, tapping her feet in irritation.

"When did she get there?" Sakura exchanged a bewildered glance with Sasuke.

* * *

"You kissed a fish, you kissed a fish!" Naruto was yelling.

_'Oh, they're back,'_ reluctantly Kakashi closed his book. He wished they could have taken a little longer.

"There is no way anyone but a moron like you would consider that a kiss," Sasuke retorted flatly. "That wasn't even a human. Besides which, there is no way I'm losing my 47th kiss to a fish."

"Wait, wasn't it your forty second you lost to Naruto…?" Sakura asked, confused.

"More people have managed to '_accidentally_' kiss me in that time, Sakura," Sasuke explained.

'_God fucking damnit,'_ Inner Sakura thought.

"Your lips touched, it was totally a kiss!" Naruto yelled back.

Kakashi closed his eyes in exasperation and counted to ten. _'Are they ever going to grow up?'_ He thought, despairingly. He waited until they had all entered the clearing and then turned to the one sort-of sane person on his team. "Sakura, mission report."

"Fresh fish stinks!" Sakura groaned.

Kakashi narrowed his eyes at her. "Very funny, Sakura, now report."

Sakura narrowed her eyes right back. "We took a mission to stock a shop in the marketplace with fresh fish. The mission went exactly as expected. Everyone worked efficiently, without distractions."

Kakashi pointed at Naruto and Sasuke who were still yelling at each other. "Really?" he asked dubiously.

"Naru Naru-chan asked if she could take one of the fish too small to sell. Then she ambushed Sasuke-kun and held the fish's lips up to his. Now she's insisting he kissed the fish," Sakura sighed in embarrassment.

"Right," Kakashi felt like yelling at them until he lost his voice and deafened both of them. Even someone as laid back as he couldn't take all this idiocy.

Before he could, Sakura interrupted him. "She made sure to wait until the mission was over before doing that," she continued reluctantly.

So now he didn't even have a plausible reason to yell at them. They had specifically waited until their mission was over to squabble _just_ to fuck with him. "Sakura," he sighed. "Please don't ever change. Please, please, I don't know what I'll do if I have three idiots on my team."

Sakura nodded reassuringly. "I won't, Kakashi-sensei." Her eyes were fixed on Sasuke arguing with Naruto about something stupid yet again, and she had to struggle to remind herself he was the best ninja ever. Because right now, he sure wasn't acting like it. "I love Sasuke-kun, I love him," she reminded herself.

"All right, come here guys!" Kakashi yelled. Immediately Naruto and Sasuke stopped squabbling and approached him with only a whispered, "We'll settle this with Rock Paper Scissors."

Sasuke nodded in acceptance. "Best out of three?"

"Best out of three."

Well, at least they were managing to schedule their squabbling so it wouldn't get in the way of training. _'I swear me and Obito were never this bad.'_ Kakashi wondered somewhat belatedly, if he should feel bad for Minato-sensei. Then again he was pretty sure he had never been such a handful.

"So, now I'll teach you guys the shunshin. The shunshin is," at this he paused, disappeared in a cloud of smoke, and reappeared behind Naruto, "a technique that allows ninja to move at very high speeds. Civilians tend to think this technique is instantaneous transportation but that is incorrect. To distract the eye, and cover the path of movement when shunshin is instigated, shinobi leave behind a plume of smoke. Well, usually smoke. Some prefer using other substances such as leaves - very popular in Konoha - flowers, ink, oil etc."

His three students all looked at him with wide eyes. "Awesome," Naruto and Sakura whispered. Sasuke didn't say anything but on his face was an expression like Christmas had come early for him.

"To use this technique is very simple. Simply form the ram seal, and concentrate your chakra creating a shroud of chakra around your body. The chakra shroud around your body will enhance your movements. Make sure to have a clear picture of your destination in mind, as controlling your movement while moving at such a high speed is very difficult. It's best if you start off with moving in a straight line and then working your way up."

"Sasuke," he ruffled the boy's hair. "Your cousin, Shisui Uchiha was famed as 'Shisui of the body flicker' because he was so good at this technique he could even use it in the middle of battle. Some people even gave him the nickname, 'Protege of the fourth Hokage'."

Giving Sasuke something to feel proud about might help him temporarily suppress his pride-related issues for the moment - he hoped.

"Wow! Your cousin was awesome, Sasuke!" Naruto exclaimed. Kakashi noted with surprise that Sasuke looked more pleased at the praise from Naruto, than the praise from himself.

_'They're developing a somewhat interesting relationship_,' Kakashi thought.

"All of you can have a go at the technique now. It's your first time so don't be embarrassed if you get it wrong. I'm not expecting any miracles," Kakashi advised.

All three of them eagerly formed the ram seal and channelled their chakra.

With some surprise, Sasuke found himself standing right in front of a tree stump, quite a few metres from his desired goal.

As soon as Naruto used the technique a crack like a gunshot was heard and almost instantly, her form appeared on the other side of the clearing, crashing into a tree and rebounding off the surface. "Oww!" she yelled.

Sakura had... Sakura had disappeared from sight. "Sakura?" Kakashi called. In the space of one blink she was back in front of him, breathing heavily and looking exhausted.

"Sakura, where did you go?" Kakashi asked her. "I told you to stick to straight lines and not to try anything too ambitious for a beginner."

"The Hokage Mountain was in a straight line from me. I just thought I'd try it and see how well it worked. It worked!" Sakura cheered.

Naruto and Sasuke gaped at her open mouthed. "Wow, you're awesome Sakura-chan!" Naruto praised.

Kakashi also stared at her, though in a less slack-jawed manner. His students were just full of surprises, it seemed. "You might have even already mastered the technique just like that," Kakashi admitted. "But that was a foolish move. You were already low on chakra from sustaining the leaf-training exercise overnight. You could have collapsed from chakra exhaustion."

Sakura blushed. She was supposed to be the smartest student in the year so how on earth had she forgotten about that? "Sorry, Kakashi-sensei," she apologised.

"It's okay, Pedo-sensei! Sakura-chan can just take some of my chakra, right?" Naruto asked.

"Yep. It'll benefit you too, since you'll be drawing from a smaller pool of chakra. Sakura, use smaller distances but try some different movements. Move in a curved line, move to higher or lower ground and try landing in different positions. Sasuke you're using slightly too much chakra, put less into the technique. Naruto, you have a tendency to overload every jutsu you try with way too much chakra. For half an hour, pay attention to Sasuke and Sakura performing the technique before you attempt it yourself," he ordered.

Naruto moved to transfer her chakra to Sakura. Even though she filled Sakura's reserves to about 3/4 full, the drain wasn't very large. The sense of loss bothered her more than anything. Then, while Sasuke and Sakura performed the technique she moved to a tree stump to observe them. _'This sucks. Even Sasuke is better at this than me,' _she silently grumbled.

Sasuke wasn't even moving very far. Was he trying to make fun of her because she accidentally propelled herself into a tree? Naruto noticed Sasuke was moving gradually larger and larger distances, to gauge his chakra usage so that he could grasp the mechanics of the technique.

_'That's actually... very helpful.'_

For Naruto, with her chakra sensor abilities, by watching him she could slowly see the differences in the amounts of chakra and roughly get a grasp of how much chakra equalled how much distance.

_'Naruto, you moron, you better be paying attention,_' Sasuke wanted to try larger distances but he was purposely moving in small graduations to help her see how the technique worked.

_'Why am I helping her anyway... Well, whatever, the sooner she learns this, the sooner we move onto new training and I end up stronger. This is all for my goal in the end,'_ he comforted himself, trying to pretend this strategical way of practicing wasn't actually boring him to death.

"Hey, Sasuke! Stop half-assing the jutsu, it's freaking boring me to death!" Naruto yelled. She got how it worked now and watching him was just boring.

Sasuke turned to look at her, formed the ram seal and shunshinned right in front of her, startling her off her stump. _'That's the last time I ever try to help you_,' he thought.

Naruto scrambled back up to her feet and glared at him. Sasuke glared back. With a sigh, Kakashi walked over and hit them both on the back of the head with his book. "Back to work," he growled at them.

Simultaneously they both turned to glare rebelliously at him but went back to what they were doing. Kakashi walked back to his stump and practically slumped against it. How was he supposed to control these two?!

Maybe he'd ask Kurenai. Kurenai was good with teenagers.

* * *

"Don't talk with your mouth full, Naruto," Kakashi sighed.

Naruto hastily chewed and swallowed. "I wanted to thank you for treating us, Pedo-sensei. Thank you Pedo-sensei!" she grinned at him.

Kakashi glanced around at the other customers, all with shocked looks on their faces. "You can thank me by not calling me Pedo-sensei anymore," he hinted.

Naruto laughed at him. "Don't be silly, Pedo-sensei! But really, thanks for the food."

Kakashi just shook his head. "Whatever." He turned to look at the pile of empty bowls next to her. _'1, 2, 4, 7, 8. Eight bowls?! I feel sorry for Iruka.'_ he thought.

* * *

"Did you guys enjoy your lunch?" Kakashi asked. Naruto beamed and Sakura nodded. Unlike Naruto she'd had a normal two bowls. Naruto had... Well he'd started feeling queasy when she started on her eighth so he didn't know. He didn't want to know.

"What about you, Sasuke?"

Sasuke pulled his strange 'squint and it could be called a pout' pout. "There were no tomatoes in my ramen," he sighed morosely.

"Normally they don't put tomatoes in ramen, Sasuke," Kakashi explained.

"Next time we can go to a salad bar," Naruto offered. Kakashi looked at her in surprise. Naruto knew what salad was? "But immediately afterwards we go for Ramen!" she declared. That made sense, Naruto had been the one to suggest ramen after all.

Sasuke almost-smiled a silent thank you at her and Kakashi shook his head. _'What is with these two? Do they like each other or hate each other? And why can't they make up their minds...?'_ He resolved to ask Kurenai. Kurenai would know. Kurenai knew everything.

"Alright then, you guys have two more hours to train before we go on our next mission. Sasuke, Naruto, continue practicing. Sakura, you've pretty much mastered the technique so why not try using it in battle in a friendly spar with me?"

Sakura quickly backed away from him, shaking her head.

"I'll go easy on you!" Kakashi reassured her. Sakura did not look convinced.

"Hey Sasuke, want to try sparring with the shunshin too?" Naruto asked excitedly. Sasuke's face lit up but before he could answer Kakashi hit them both with his book again.

"You've only just finished moving in straight lines. Go and practice properly _far away_ from each other." he ordered. Again, they both glared at him but moved to do what he said. Kakashi looked at Sakura's face. _'Ah, the normal one. Don't ever change,'_ he thought.

* * *

"That was going easy on me?" Sakura asked dryly.

Kakashi ignored her question. "Congratulations Sakura, you've mastered the Shunshin!"

"But I didn't even hit you once. Even though I was moving so fast and you barely used the shunshin yourself." Sakura complained.

"That's down to practice. Mastering the shunshin is different from being able to use it effectively for battle. You have to get used to moving at high speed first so it doesn't tire your limbs out," Kakashi explained.

Sakura's face brightened up at this and they went off to collect Sasuke and Naruto. Sasuke they found first and he had apparently mastered moving in lines that weren't straight because he was now trying to shunshin up a tree. Naruto, when they found her was doing exactly the same thing.

_'Surprisingly, they're kind of similar,'_ Kakashi thought.

"Now we get to go on our last mission!" Kakashi declared with a pleased smile. All three of his students groaned discontentedly. "Oh come on, I picked this mission especially for you, Naruto!"

"Why me?" Naruto asked suspiciously.

"Because you're my favourite, of course!" Kakashi smiled, ruffling her hair.

"I thought I was your favourite!" Sakura complained.

"I thought Sakura was your favourite!" Naruto protested.

"I thought I was your favourite." Sasuke looked very put out. In a subtle, emotionless way of course.

Kakashi scoffed. "Now, I understand why you'd think Sakura was my favourite and really it's not her fault she has pink hair but – Sasuke? What? Why on earth would you think you were my favourite?"

Sasuke declined to answer, obviously choosing to almost-sulk instead.

"Sasuke, you have no sense of humour, and that's just sad. Sakura has pink hair which again, sad. But Naruto's just an idiot so obviously she's the only real choice to be my favourite!" Kakashi explained.

Sakura and Sasuke looked very disappointed and let down at this.

"I don't want to be your favourite... You're kind of an ass," Naruto complained.

"Did someone say ass?!" Kakashi squealed, blushing a pretty pink. His students were not amused. "Oh, come on, it's funny!" Still, they continued to glare at him. "Well, at least, I thought it was funny..." Kakashi blushed.

"Whatever, you guys obviously have no sense of humour," he sighed in mock disapproval.

"So, what does this mission have to with me again?" Naruto asked irritatedly.

"The mission is to help out Ichirakus Ramen by waitressing during the rush hour of course. And apparently in addition to our reward we get a free bowl of ramen on the house," he smiled at them.

_'More ramen?'_ Sasuke and Sakura both thought, unimpressed.

"Woo, you're the best Pedo-sensei!" Naruto enthusiastically hug-tackled Kakashi, then jumped off still grinning at him.

"I know I am," Kakashi grinned back at her. "Sakura, Sasuke you two should also be happy because I've given both of you a valuable opportunity!" They both stared blankly at him. "Sasuke, you get to look at your two cute teammates in aprons, and Sakura you get to show off your domestic skills for Sasuke!"

Sasuke looked back at him unimpressed though Sakura was starting to look a little bit more excited.

"That's the spirit!" Kakashi patted them both on the shoulder and steered them towards the ramen stall, Naruto eagerly trailing after them.

* * *

When he got there he cheerfully greeted Teuchi and Ayane and turned back to his team to educate them. "Do you see," he pointed at Ayame in her white apron, "the charm of a woman in an apron?" Sakura and Sasuke both rolled their eyes at him. Naruto, to his surprise opened her mouth and bared her teeth at him.

"Don't flirt with Ayame-neechan," she ordered.

Ayame giggled and Kakashi merely shrugged his shoulders at her unabashedly. "So, do you have any pink aprons?" he asked, winking at her.

With ceremony, Ayame pulled out an apron from a cupboard and held it up. It was a light shade of pink, thankfully not hot pink, with girlish ruffles around the edges. "Former marketing strategy," she cheerfully explained to Naruto.

"And what a good marketing strategy it is..." Kakashi murmured.

Naruto paled and backed away. "I am not wearing that. No no no no no."

Kakashi scoffed. "Who said anything about you?" He whipped the apron off the counter and neatly tied it at the back of his midsection. "How do I look?" he asked.

Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke all looked at him in horror.

Teuchi and Ayame both grinned at him.

"Perfect!" Ayame announced.

"That'll get us customers for sure," Teuchi beamed.

Naruto's face scrunched up in disgust. "Adults are weird!" she declared. Sakura and Sasuke were inclined to agree with her.

"Here," Ayame handed them all plain white aprons, free of ornamentation and white bandanas to tie their hair back.

_'Now this is more like it! Sasuke, what do you think? Am I cute?'_ Sakura looked at Sasuke hopefully, hoping he was finally taking notice of her. Instead she froze at the image of Sasuke in a white apron tying the bandana around his head_. 'That's so girly! But why... does he look so cute?' _Sakura covered her cheeks with her hands, trying to will her blush away. _'Sasuke-kun will call me a pervert if he catches me blushing! Stop blushing! Argh, what's wrong with me?'  
_  
_'Hey, I wonder how he'd look in girls clothes,'_ inner Sakura suggested.

Sakura turned a brilliant shade of scarlet. _'I thought you'd decided to behave! Shut up! I like Sasuke-kun as a man!'  
_  
Kakashi felt a drop of sweat manifest on his face. _'It's so easy to see what she's thinking...'  
_  
"Hey, Teuchi-jiisan can I wear a hat like yours instead?" Naruto asked.

"Your hair is longer than mine so you have to push it back with the bandana first," Teuchi ordered, handing her a chef's hat far more voluminous than his own.

"Woah, what an awesome hat! Look everyone, I'm a chef!" Naruto laughed.

Kakashi rolled his eyes at her antics. Teuchis' and Ayames' faces mirrored the same exasperated amusement he felt. Naruto was such a goofball but after a while she grew on you. _'Like a parasite,'_ he thought to himself with a wry chuckle.

"Hey, Pedo-sensei, do I have permission to transform?" Naruto asked.

"Why do you want to transform, Naru Naru-chan?" Sakura asked, finally tearing her eyes away from Sasuke.

"I don't want to hurt business. And my features are pretty recognisable," Naruto explained, pointing to her whisker marks.

Before Sakura or Sasuke could say anything Kakashi nodded. "Go ahead."

"Right! Henge!" When the cloud of chakra laced smoke cleared from in front of them, standing there was someone who did not resemble Naruto at all. A boy their age with black eyes, auburn hair and an austere look on his face materialised before their eyes. Her clothes had also changed to suit him, instead of her normal attire; the boy was wearing a red haori over formal black robes.

_'Wow, he's totally hot. Do you think he's still wearing girls' underwear under those robes?'_ Inner Sakura wondered.

_'You are sick! That's Naruto!'_ Sakura mentally yelled at her.

"Hihito Higure, at your service," Naruto bowed. Her voice had changed too but instead of sounding masculine it sounded slightly androgynous and she spoke in clipped tones. "I am here to help in whatever way I can."

Sasuke, Sakura and Kakashi all stared at her in surprise. "Have you ever taken acting classes, Naruto?" Kakashi asked. He recalled the very convincing expressions of fear and disappointment her decoy had adopted in the exams.

"No," Narutos' lips quirked slightly into a wry smile. "I'm not a _'master of disguise'_ or any such thing, this character is simply someone I'm plagiarising from a book."

They kept staring at her. She sounded nothing like Naruto.

"In case anyone is wondering, that book is about five males in a school who are the founders and members of a tea ceremony club. But really this club is a cover for their real activities, as celestials descended to earth they are tasked with wiping out all demonic presence. Then to their great surprise a boy called Hihito earnestly joins their club. Because they are so bad at deception he quickly figures out their real purpose... It's a really good book! And in three months it's getting an anime adaption!" Naruto explained.

They all looked at each other. That sounded like Naruto.

"Oy, 'Hihito' your cover is slipping," Kakashi pointed out.

Naruto drew herself up to her full height and apathetically folded her arms across her chest. "It won't happen again," she promised them tonelessly.

And the cover was back. Well, whatever. "All right, back to work you three," Kakashi ordered, lightly whacking them with his book.

* * *

Naruto stretched her arms out lazily as they walked back to training ground 7. "Nothing like a big bowl of Ramen after a hard day's work!" she proclaimed.

"It's only 7pm," Kakashi pointed out. "The day is far from over, 'Hihito'."

Naruto shot him a look. "Are you making fun of me?"

Kakashi smiled back at her with his one visible eye. "Of course not! I'm honestly surprised at how good your acting skills are. In fact it would be nice if I had a kid like that on my team..."

"Too bad, Pedo-sensei! You passed us and now you're stuck with us!" Naruto stuck her tongue out at him.

"Hey Naru Naru-chan," Sakura started.

"What is it, Sakura-chan?"

"If I asked you to prank Ino - to ask her out for a date as Hihito to prove she doesn't really love Sasuke, would you do it?" Sakura asked solemnly.

Sasuke rolled his eyes. Girls could be so stupid. Then again... if he could get Naruto to make Hihito clones and take his fangirls out on dates maybe they would stop bothering him... Well, it was worth looking into at any rate.

"I'd do it if you paid me," Naruto replied instantly.

"Uh...how much?" Sakura asked.

"Not with money. You have to teach me a new technique." Naruto replied.

"But I don't know any you don't know..." Sakura replied in confusion.

Naruto grinned at her. "Then learn one."

Kakashi listened to their conversation with some interest. If Naruto was going to start hiring herself out for pranks he had some people who he thought deserved it... Naruto was an unstoppable force when it came to pranks, if her academy record was correct.

"All right guys, now we're going to get back to the Shunshin! I want all of you to master it before today's over and if you do..."

"You'll teach us a new technique?" Naruto asked hopefully.

Kakashi chuckled at the thought. "No. If you manage to master the shunshin technique, I'll train you to use the shunshin under killing intent!" He beamed at them.

"Not more killing intent!" groaned Sakura.

"At least we're not learning how to stick a pansy leaf to our heads," Sasuke supplied.

"You. Are. Such. An. Ass!" Naruto complained, glaring at Kakashi.

Kakashis ears perked up. "Did someone say-"

"NO!" They all shouted.

Kakashi giggled at the enraged looks on their faces. What a shame he hadn't brought along his camera.

* * *

**SHINOBI DICTIONARY**

**Chakra siphon: **Reaching out with your chakra to grasp the target's projected chakra, you siphon off a portion of theirs to boost your own. There are drawbacks to this technique – it is only to be used if the chakra is intended to be used up quickly.

**Reverse chakra siphon: **The exact reverse of the Chakra Siphon of taking chakra you give chakra.

***** The other forms of this are forcibly draining an opponent's body of all chakra, using chakra to revive a body that has slipped into chakra death, and as a way to clean an allies chakra of impurities or poisons. These techniques may pop up in story later.

**Chakra death: **Chakra exhaustion happens when you are very low on chakra – the body immediately shuts down, self-preservation instinct. Chakra death is when for some reason chakra exhaustion does not happen and all chakra is drained from your body. If not promptly treated it will lead to actual death.

**Is there a significance to Kakashi and Sasuke's chakra feeling bull awful? **Yes. Basically, they both need therapy.

**Shunshin: **A high speed movement masked traditionally by a plume of smoke. Other substances can be used as well. One example is a mass of leaves – Quite popular in Konoha. This is one of the first lessons learnt after graduation. (Canon technique – unexplored potential)

**Naruto and Sasuke's relationship: **No comment.

**Aprons: **Bring out the innate beauty in both man and woman. Adds adorableness to kids. Even Zetsu looks good in one. Team Apron!

**Kakashi: **He's just messing around with them. Also he can cry and blush on command.

**Inner Sakura: **Is a pervert? That's original.

**Is Hihito important? Very important? Plot relevant? Will he be a cover on a long-term mission? Is he from a real story? Will someone fall for him not realising he is a she and cause WACKY HIJINKS?! **No

**Is there a point to Hihito? **No

Hihito is just a disguise. Other disguises may show up later in story. Naruto reads a lot of manga and watches a lot of anime. If the character or plot resembles a real work this is just a coincidence – I don't have the funds to around stealing franchises nor do I have the time.

* * *

END OF CHAPTER FOUR


	5. Chapter 5

CHAPTER FIVE: Kurenai is not in this chapter

* * *

**A/N: Don't read this chapter if you are one of the few lucky people with almost no body hair who never have to shave. Damn you bastards! Do you know how much the hair removal industry makes off us other people?!**

**A/N: Thoughts – italicised and single quoted**

**Dialogue – double quoted**

**Emphasis in dialogue – single quotes or italics or both for extra flavour!**

**Inner Sakura – single quotes, italics and underlined.**

**A/N: Kurenai is a badass**

**A/N: Please review and fill the review hole in my heart.**

**A/N: Soooome of you may have noticed… I now have a story picture and a profile picture! It was my first time drawing a chibi Naruto. How does it look? I'd appreciate some feedback! (Btw, my profile is wearing an earring that says vicious… it can be kind of hard to read. As in vicious sexy, yeah!)**

**A/N: You may have noticed my story seems to have now shrunk… This is not the case! Actually considering some of the major edits you're getting this is like two for the price of one. Two chapters in one week! (Now would be a good time to reread the first couple of chapters…)**

**I've combined the first three chapters - getting rid of some of the unnecessary story that everyone already knows from canon and just focusing on the things I've changed. I noticed that compared to later chapters they tend to drag a bit... **

**Details: There is now more rivalry, more Konohamaru-Naruto bonding, Iruka-Naruto bonding, secretly-badass Hinata (she hides all the badassness in her jacket), more Sakura-Naruto bonding and two new sexy jutsu techniques. Minus One. Also modified later chapters to match up, so no more hnspeak or blue-moon sama jokes. Not that they're not funny… but Sasuke rarely says hn in cannon and I couldn't fit in the blue moon-sama gag while making it relevant to my story.**

* * *

Kakashi strolled into the grounds of Training Ground Seven, punctual for the first time since his acquisition of a team. "Hiii, Sasuke, Sakura!" he greeted cheerfully shunshinning behind them.

At which point he was surprised to find them moved from their previous positions, and flanking him, Sasuke with a kunai again aimed at his precious Icha Icha. He surreptitiously adjusted his pouch to face away from him.

"That trick won't work on us anymore, sensei," Sakura explained.

Kakashi beamed at his two cute students. "Wow, you guys have completely mastered the shunshin! Naruto is still a little behind you two, but I have no doubt she'll use her personal time to catch up."

After puffing up with pride, Sakura returned to the matter at hand. "Speaking of Naru Naru-chan, Kakashi-sensei, why isn't she here yet?"

Kakashi smiled shamelessly at them. "I told her to come at a different time than you guys! Aren't you two happy to get some extra training from your sensei without any orange or loudness interrupting us?"

Sakura's pleasant demeanour instantly dropped. "I thought you were better than that, sensei."

Sasuke just looked at him, clearly not amused.

Kakashi eyed him, somewhat amused. Since when had the Uchiha started to care about his teammates? No, he realised, looking at Sasuke's expression, it was something else. They both thought he was bullying Naruto!

Sasuke seemed to realise what Kakashi was thinking because he crossed his arms defensively. "If we get training that Naruto doesn't get, it would make her less effective and compromise our teamwork in battle," he explained.

Kakashi gave in and mercilessly ruffled their hair. They both frantically tried to get their hair back into place and glared at him. "Don't be silly, you two! I have an important meeting with the Hokage-sama about Naruto and I decided it would be prudent if you two accompanied me! You're both smart kids after all; it wouldn't do to leave you out of the loop."

At this they both stopped glaring at him in favour of looking proud of themselves.

Sakura opened her mouth, still confused. "But, Kakashi-sensei"-

"No!" Kakashi cheerfully shushed her. "It's an important meeting with Hokage-sama, we don't want to be late!" When no-one pointed out to him that he was always late anyway he briefly started missing the presence of Naruto. _'It's so quiet and... sensible without her,_' he thought sadly.

* * *

They made their way through the already familiar path to the Hokage's tower. Before the large red doors, Kakashi paused to give his team some last minute advice. "Pay close attention and don't forget what we tell you," he mysteriously informed Sasuke and Sakura. They both faced him seriously and nodded then they went in through the doors.

Iruka and the Hokage started, looked up to greet Kakashi, and noticed his two tagalongs.

"Why are Sakura and Sasuke here?" Iruka asked the Hokage in surprise.

"Kakashi?" The Hokage asked him.

"It's better if they hear what we're going to discuss, Hokage-sama. They're both smart kids so they might figure it out on their own and tell Naruto," Kakashi explained. _'And they get to feel all responsible and grown up,'_ he silently added. That was the main reason he was including them - treating them with respect so they in turn would listen to him more carefully.

The third Hokage nodded at Iruka so Iruka decided to proceed with the discussion. "As we all know, Naruto has a solid clone technique. This technique, called the shadow clone has a few advantages and disadvantages associated with it that the other techniques don't."

"This technique works by creating shadow duplicates with exactly half of the users' chakra. For someone like Naruto, this is no big issue. With the amount of chakra she has she can easily create a dozen clones and have them all use chakra based techniques at the same time. The bigger problem would be Narutos' lack of combat experience and lack of skills. With her direction the clones would likely end up moving randomly and unorganized, leaving a skilled enemy with many chances to dispel them before they can get hurt themselves. In addition to this it only requires one solid hit to dispel them," Iruka explained.

"As her teammates, you two have to cover for the weaknesses in Narutos' technique until she can learn to use it more effectively," Kakashi told them. Sasuke and Sakura both gave a sharp nod.

"And be sure not to tell anyone the details of this technique. It is a forbidden technique for a reason," The Hokage warned, nodding to Iruka to continue.

"The main disadvantage of this technique is the reason it came to be named a forbidden technique. Outside of the obvious uses like spying or battle, this technique also has other uses. For someone with the chakra capacity of Naruto this technique could seriously shorten the amount of time it takes to teach her new things. Memories and experiences from the clones are shared with the owner. This also extends to mastery of chakra based techniques and muscle memory. The clones can't improve the physical strength of the owner but I'm sure you can already see the advantages," Iruka explained, looking directly at Sasuke and Sakura.

Sakura looked intrigued while Sasuke's' expression had fractionally darkened again. Kakashi resisted the urge to shake his head.

"So what's the disadvantage then, Iruka-sensei?" Sakura asked.

"Basically, this technique exerts mental strain upon the user. It differs from user to user and it also depends on how the technique is used. If a lot of clones are created and quickly dispelled the effects felt by the user will be minimal. If those same clones are active a whole day and then dispel, the sudden acquisition of so many sets of memories will severely harm the users brain. In a severe enough frame of time or with enough shadow clones the user can even die. That's the basics of the technique as far as I was briefed." Iruka finished.

"So basically we're holding a meeting to determine if Naruto should accelerate her training with shadow clones. As her teammates, what do you two think?" Kakashi asked Sakura and Sasuke.

Sakura gave him a horrified look. "Of course not! Naru Naru-chan could die!"

"The drawbacks seem to outweigh the benefits," Sasuke answered, frowning.

Kakashi exchanged amused glances with the other two adults in the room. "Naruto has a self-healing ability she inherited from her mother," The Hokage lied. "It's possible she could attempt this technique and suffer no adverse effects at all."

"If that were the case," Kakashi interrupted, "we could use the technique to help her rapidly get stronger. The only problem is that we have to test it to see if the technique does affect her or not."

"Why don't you just tell Naruto this information and ask her to help you test out your theory?" Sasuke asked.

"Because even if the theory was wrong Naru Naru-chan is so reckless she would probably train with shadow clones anyway. And even if the theory is right, you don't want Naru Naru-chan overextending herself and throwing off our teamwork, right?" Sakura asked, deep in thought.

Kakashi grinned proudly at Iruka and the Third Hokage. Sakura would easily be his favourite student... if not for the pink hair. "Right, that's why we're trying to come up with a solution that doesn't involve telling Naruto." Kakashi didn't bother to explain that all three adults had already come to a decision and were merely having a meeting to discuss the implementation of their solution. He wanted to see if Sakura and Sasuke could figure it out on their own.

"Then, since Naruto is always lagging behind with her chakra control, how about letting her use one or two clones so she doesn't hold us back, without explaining the mechanics of the technique to her?" Sasuke asked. "She's' pretty slow so she won't figure it out on her own."

"And then if she gets used to training with a few clones, you can progressively make her train with more and more. Frankly, regarding chakra control, Naru Naru-chan pretty much needs all the help she can get anyway," Sakura added.

"And you two wouldn't get jealous of all the extra experience she gets through the shadow clones?" Kakashi asked slyly.

"If I tried to train using a B-ranked technique continuously with my chakra capacity I'd probably pass out. It makes sense for Naru Naru-chan to improve on her training with the shadow clone technique," Sakura shrugged.

After a very long dragging moment of frowning, Sasuke finally acquiesced. "Heh, that idiot needs all the help she can get," he smirked.

Inwardly Kakashi was jumping for joy. His first major step to curing Sasuke of his stickintheassitis! Iruka was gaping at him in surprise and even the Hokage looked startled. No doubt, they'd both expected Sasuke to ask to learn the shadow clone technique too so he could train more effectively.

Kakashi patted them both on the head. "That's exactly the solution we came to! I have to finish my meeting with Hokage-sama first, but if you two wait outside I`ll treat you to breakfast afterwards. Just the two of you, how does that sound?" he smiled at them. As he'd expected Sakura instantly blushed. She was probably thinking that it was like a date situation with Sasuke. Her thoughts were so easy to read.

"Um, Kakashi-sensei?"

"Yes?" Kakashi asked patiently. _'She better not be trying to ask me for dating advice,_' he thought.

Sakura blushed. "Can we pick up some food for Naru Naru-chan, too? I'm not asking you to pay or anything!" she quickly added. "I-I'll pay, but it would be unfair to leave her out, right...?" Sakura quickly looked away, feeling embarrassed that it had sounded like she wanted Kakashi to pay.

Kakashis visible eye widened in surprise. Maybe they didn't completely see each other as teammates yet but that kind of attitude would really help speed things along. "Sure," he smiled at Sakura, "we can pick up something for Naruto too."

"It's such a shame she has pink hair..." he told Iruka sadly.

Iruka sighed and shook his head, "I know, right?"

* * *

Naruto wandered over to the clearing yawning widely. Yet again, she had stayed up trying to master another technique. Sasuke and Sakura had perfected it, but Naruto... She was probably going to ask Iruka-sensei to help her train the shunshin under killing intent in her free time. Iruka-sensei was nice so he wouldn't mind spending a few hours helping her train. And she was almost done too, she could feel it.

"Hey guys," Naruto greeted lazily. She was surprised to note that Kakashi was there as well - that meant not only were Sasuke and Sakura early but Kakashi-sensei was as well!

Without warning Sasuke tossed a plastic bag at her face. "What was that for?" Naruto asked - too tired to be annoyed - catching the bag neatly.

"Look inside," Sasuke ordered.

"We met early so we all got breakfast together. Since you weren't around, Sasuke-kun and I decided to buy some for you," Sakura explained.

"Awesome!" Naruto excitedly examined the bag, finding a paper bag with savoury dumplings inside. "So good! Not ramen good but still good!" she exclaimed, her voice muffled by a mouthful of food.

"The sad thing about this is that she probably already had 7 bowls of instant ramen for breakfast," Sakura confided to Sasuke. Sasuke just shook his head in disbelief.

"Are we going to do another mission when Naru Naru-chan's finished eating, sensei?" Sakura asked.

"Actually, I do have to talk to you guys about that..." Kakashi trailed off mysteriously. Then, when Sasuke and Sakura tried to get answers out of him he refused to say anything until Naruto had finished eating. Instead, he took the time to collect from Naruto and Sasuke their 5000 word essays on teamwork and started to read through them.

Naruto finally finished eating so Kakashi decided to put them out of their misery. "As you may have noticed I've left off addressing your Taijutsu, Ninjutsu and Genjutsu abilities. Today I will be holding a joint team Taijutsu workshop, with another jounin-sensei, a taijutsu specialist, to get you the best possible foundation to start off with. Unlike Ninjutsu and Genjutsu, Taijutsu has no special requirements. There are as many styles and variations of Taijutsu as there are leaves in the wind. When you have no more chakra left, when stealth and deceptions don't work, what's left is Taijutsu. Every ninja must have a good base in Taijutsu. Chakra can be stolen, weapons can be stolen, even thoughts can be stolen - but no one can take away your skill at Taijutsu," Kakashi explained.

"So Naruto," he smiled, "How do you feel about seeing Neji again?"

"Really? Are you serious, Pedo-sensei?" Naruto was about to burst with excitement. "When I see Neji I can show him how good I've gotten at the shunshin and impress him!"

_'He won't be impressed,'_ thought Sasuke, Sakura and Kakashi. They didn't bother to explain to Naruto that Neji had already been a ninja for a year and knew way more techniques than the shunshin.

* * *

"Neji! I learned the shunshin! I'll make you fall even more in love with me!"

"Uzumaki," Neji greeted. "Why are your teammates here?"

"Jeez Neji. You're so cold!" Naruto pouted. "I told you so many times to call me Naruto!"

Neji turned to his teammate in exasperation. "She's ignoring me again. Can you ask her why her team is here?"

Tenten shook her head with a wry smile. "Oy, Naru-kun, why are you and you teammates here?"

"Hey Neji! Do you want to see my shunshin? It's totally awesome! Do you, do you?!"  
Tenten just shook her head again and gave Neji a look that said _'Sorry, I tried'_.

Neji realised that it was a lost cause. "Alright, Uzumaki, go ahead."

With a grin Naruto shunshinned behind Neji and enfolded her arms around him. "There's room for improvement," Neji commented.

"You do realise that Neji has known this technique for a year, right, Naru-kun? Something like that won't impress him," Tenten explained.

"I get a free hug - that means it's my victory!" Naruto laughed. "Come on Neji, Tenten-chan I think Pedo-sensei is going to explain today's training now."

"Pedo-sensei?" Neji mouthed to Tenten.

Tenten shrugged. "Do you want to know?" She mouthed back.

* * *

"My students!" Gai boomed. "This is my eternal rival, Kakashi! Today he and I will be conducting a joint Taijutsu workshop. First, introduce yourselves to each other and then I will explain the basics of what we are going to do."

"Alright, I'll start. Yo, I'm Kakashi and these are my students, Sakura Haruno, Sasuke Uchiha and Naruto Uzumaki," he pointed to each one in turn.

"I am Maito Gai, the beautiful green beast of Konoha! These here are my lovely students Neji Hyuuga, Tenten Higurashi, and my cute disciple Rock Lee!"

"Is Lee-san your son?" Sakura asked politely.

"You know I get that question a lot..." Gai said thoughtfully, "but no! Regrettable though it may be, we are not related - in fact, Lee is an orphan."

"Oh, I'm sorry Lee-san!" Sakura hastily apologised.

"There is no need to worry Sakura-san! I couldn't possibly take offense from someone so seraphic!" Lee replied, giving her the nice guy pose.

_'Seraphic? And… is... is he blushing?' _Sakura felt just a tad bit uneasy.

"Hey, what gives Lee? You've never called me soporific before! And I thought we were friends!" Naruto protested.

"Well, that is because I..." Lee trailed off, staring intently at Sakura.

"Uhhhh," Sakura was starting to feel very uncomfortable.

"Lee, don't stare - you're creeping her out!" Tenten whacked him on the back and Lee immediately came out of his daze.

"Ah, the youthful passions that take hold in the spring," Gai commented.

"It's autumn, actually," Kakashi corrected him. Well, it looked like Gai was going to go off on another tangent about youth or passion so Kakashi decided to intervene before things got too bad. "Okay kids, chit-chat time is over. You can all get to know each other better after you train. Prior to the workshop itself your health and fitness capabilities will be tested. Then all of you will spar against each other in separate matches, Taijutsu only. Gai and I will come around and correct any flaws in your stance or rhythm. Then we will talk to all of you individually about your skill prognosis and what you should be training and focusing on."

"We've already done this with Gai-sensei, though," Lee objected.

"Right you are my adorable student! The hip Kakashi will be casting Genjutsu on the three of you while you are battling his cute students. As you know this is an area I do not have much knowledge in, so in the afternoon he will be holding a Genjutsu workshop for the three of you! His Genjutsu skills are at a high level, so this should prove most beneficial," Gai explained. "Lee, while it is true that you cannot cast Genjutsu yourself, you still must get used to breaking it so this will be a very valuable opportunity for you."

"Gai-sensei!" His eyes filled with tearful appreciation.

"Lee!"

"Gai-sensei!"

They started to embrace.

"Those two are really starting to disturb me..." Sakura whispered to Sasuke. Sasuke nodded, looking slightly appalled.

"And there you have it," Kakashi lazily finished. "For matches I'll set Sakura against Tenten - all the dodging will be good for your stamina, Neji against Sasuke, and Lee against Naruto as you have similarities in your Taijutsu types. Any questions?"

No-one seemed to have any, so Gai took over. "Then Kakashi and I will start the testing process. It's very simple, we'll have you perform some stretches to assess your flexibility, test your stamina through running and basic exercises and..."

* * *

"I must admit I'm impressed Naruto-kun. You don't seem tired at all," Lee remarked.

"Yeah, but you're not tired either Lee," Naruto pointed out.

"That is because my daily training with Gai-sensei is more taxing than this, and I have already been training for a year. Your team has been training for less than a week and both your teammates had to take a break after finishing Gai-senseis' tests."

"So, what are you trying to say? I'm awesome?" Naruto asked.

Lee grinned at her. "Your stamina is impressive, but no. You still need work."

"Now you sound like Neji! Aren't you supposed to be on my side?" Naruto complained.

"Well... How about if you hit me once I'll acknowledge your flames of battle?" Lee asked.

"Yes! Yes! I'll prove to you my awesomeness!"

* * *

"Sakura!" Kakashi called. "Gai and I are ready to see you now, you can stop sparring!"

Sakura wearily creaked out of her combat stance and brushed back the hair which had come out of its plait in the middle of her spar with Tenten. Or more like, the scary bun girl had deliberately aimed a senbon at one of her hair ties, hit it and scared the crap out of Sakura. Her following grin had made the message clear, _'I'm going easy on you.'_

And Sakura had still got her ass kicked in the end anyway...

_'Scary girl... You'd never guess from just looking at her.'_ Sakura gave her a wide berth as she walked over to Kakashi-sensei and Gai-sensei. Tenten gave her a friendly smile and wave before walking off to pick up her scattered weapons.

Some planks were arranged crudely in the form of a few makeshift benches and that's where Gai and Kakashi were heading with Sakura. Gai and Kakashi took one bench and Sakura took the one facing directly across from them.

"First of all," Kakashi started, "your taijutsu form is textbook perfect. There's nothing to critique there."

"When you did receive information about new forms and stances not present in the academy style, you learned to use them remarkably fast. In fact, you might be a Taijutsu genius," Gai continued.

"Me? Taijutsu Genius?" Sakura asked disbelievingly.

Gai and Kakashi looked at each other solemnly. Sakura had an inkling that whatever they were going to say next wasn't going to be good.

"Your strength is truly fearsome. It is apparent that you are strong and talented from the testing but..." Gai trailed off.

"It all comes down to stamina again," Kakashi finished. Sakura hung her head in disappointment. At this rate her stamina would render everything else useless.

"Gai has expressed personal interest in your potential. If you're interested in pursuing Taijutsu, he can get you started on a program to build up your stamina, but it will be a difficult and time-consuming task. Even if you improve your stamina naturally, your Taijutsu will always suffer. If you don't want to focus on your Taijutsu skills it might be best to concentrate on the areas of Ninjutsu and Genjutsu instead. With your chakra control, you can easily excel at those," Kakashi explained.

"So you're saying that if I don't do anything, my Taijutsu will always suck?" Sakura asked.

"It won't 'suck' Sakura-san, but against opponents of the same skill level you will be at a clear disadvantage," Gai explained.

_'Hmm... What should I do? I want to use my strength to protect Sasuke-kun but...' _Sakura was lost in thought.

"If I may Sakura-san, it remains to be seen whether or not you're a genius, but you clearly have much potential for Taijutsu. More so than your teammates, your superior strength lends itself well to a style suited to taking on multiple enemies. You would do well as a Taijutsu specialist if you chose to pursue the field," Gai said.

Sakura thought about it some more. No matter what, whatever she tried to consider, the simple fact was she didn't have enough information.

"Uh... Could I try this kind of training out for a trial period?" Sakura asked. "I can also try learning some minor Ninjutsu and Genjutsu and come to a decision about what I want to do."

Gai and Kakashi exchanged looks. "Before Gai can even start you on Taijutsu past academy level, you have to improve your stamina. You can certainly try out his training program, but whether Gai can instruct you or not is up to him. His knowledge of Taijutsu is far more specialised than mine and he would do a better job teaching a student with your specific needs than I could."

Sakura looked at Gai expectantly. "If it's not too much trouble, Gai-sensei, would it be okay if I borrowed a few hours of your knowledge from time to time?" she asked.

Gai thought it over. It was no trouble to him and he would hate to lose such a potentially talented student, and... it might help Lee get closer to her. Ah, young love...

"Sure," Gai smiled at her. "Starting next week I'll give you some lessons on the basics of Taijutsu beyond academy-level and discuss things we shall work on if you choose to pursue Taijutsu further. I'll just pencil it in the schedule for you - which you shall also start next week."

"Thank you!" Sakura hugged the eccentric bushy-eyebrowed man.

"If you do well with your schedule, Gai-sensei might even personally tutor you. We were discussing it earlier and he thinks you might be a good training companion for his other student," Kakashi remarked.

Sakura flushed in pride. Training from the guy Kakashi-sensei admitted was better than him at Taijutsu? Awesome!

"Who's your other student?" she asked. "Is it the scary bu- I mean Tenten-san?"

Kakashi looked at her drolly. "Isn't it obvious?" he asked.

With a feeling of dread Sakura remembered the smaller clone of Gai-sensei that had stared at her and blushed. _'I have a bad feeling about this...'_ Inner Sakura commented. For once Sakura was inclined to agree with her.

"Uh, it's not-"

"It's Lee, my cute student!" Gai interrupted, beaming at her.

_'__Well. Crap.'_

* * *

"Huh, what's Sakura-chan doing?" Naruto asked no-one in particular.

"What do you mean?" Lee wandered over to have a look for himself.

"See, those gray things on her arms and legs? A while ago she put them on and now she's trying to fight Tenten-chan again and kinda... sucking. More than she did before, I mean," Naruto frowned.

"Gray things?" Lee saw that on Sakura's arms and legs were fastened low level weights. "Oh, you mean training weights, like the ones I use. Gai-sensei must have thought they'd help her in some way."

"What, no way?! When I asked he wouldn't let me try them at all!" Naruto protested.

"Maybe Sakura-san is simply better at Taijutsu than you," Lee teased.

"Lee! I'm the best at Taijutsu on my team!" Naruto gave him an extremely offended look. It seemed like Neji was really starting to rub off on him... but it was only cute when Neji acted that way!

"Then prove it. You have yet to hit me even once," Lee challenged.

* * *

"Sasuke! Stop sparring - we're ready to see you now," Kakashi shouted.

Sasuke sullenly made his way over. "I almost had him," he almost squint-if-you-were-from-a-nearby-country-and-maybe-it-could-be-called-sulking sulked.

"No, you didn't, he had you. Pinned, in fact," Kakashi retorted.

"Neji does have a years' worth of training over him. And from what I saw, he was managing quite well against an opponent of Nejis' calibre," Gai interjected.

Kakashi gave him a hurt expression. _'So mean. Ruining my fun like that,'_ he thought.

"So," Gai gave Sasuke an assessing look, "you use the Uchiha style."

"Yes. I still have many things to learn, it's a very varied style," Sasuke conceded. Doubtless, if the man was a highly skilled Taijutsu specialist he'd picked up on the extent of Sasuke's knowledge already. There was no point beating around the bush after all.

"True. Originally formed to create a perfectly blended style of Ninjutsu, Taijutsu and Genjutsu, while accommodating the Sharingan. Only taught to the Uchiha clan. Openings in the Taijutsu style merely provide areas for the use of Ninjutsu or Genjutsu, correct?" Gai asked.

Sasuke stared at Gai suspiciously. "How do you know so much about the Uchiha style?" He asked.

Gai chuckled heartily, sunlight glinting off his teeth. _'So white,'_ thought Sasuke in morbid fascination.

"You are not the only Uchiha I have known, young one. The demise of such a talented clan was felt strongly by the Leaf. I have known many Uchiha, and as a Taijutsu specialist you pick up a few things here and there," he winked.

_'Horrifying,'_ thought Sasuke.

"I take it you are learning the style from scrolls and books from the Uchiha clan? There are, after all, no shinobi in the leaf village that could properly teach you," Gai concluded.

Sasuke nodded uneasily. The knowledge of this man was slightly unnerving.

"But then, there is only so much you can learn from scrolls and books. This will leave you with disadvantages, and as a consequence you will learn more slowly... How do you feel about being personally taught the Uchiha style by a higher-skilled shinobi?" Gai asked.

"But didn't you just say-"

"Kakashi can teach you!" Kakashi looked at Gai in horror. No. Nooooo. That was a horrible idea. "Kakashi would have to first learn the techniques from the scrolls and books but-"

"No. Absolutely not," Interrupted Sasuke flatly.

"Clan secret, I know. But Kakashi is your teacher and best suited to teach you. And not only will this help you but it will also be very useful for Kakashi because after all he has-"  
_  
'Don't mention my Sharingan, don't mention my Sharingan,'_ Kakashi prayed. Sasuke wasn't ready to hear about it yet.

"A close friend and teammate of his, an Uchiha. He has seen him using the Clan style before, which would assist him in learning it, and his friend would no doubt be delighted were Kakashi to personally teach his young relative the clan style!" Gai finished.

_'Thank god he didn't bring up the damn Sharingan,'_ Kakashi thought. So Gai thought he should learn the Uchiha style for his own Sharingan too? Conniving fox.

Sasuke looked at him in surprise. "He means Obito, right? The guy you told us about before? He was an Uchiha?" he asked.

"Yes," Kakashi sighed heavily. "And my best friend, as you know. He's part of the reason I got assigned your team after all - I learned a lot about the Sharingan from having him as a teammate."

Sasuke pursed his lips in thought. "What he said before - about the clan techniques, would he really be okay with me learning them off you?" he asked.

"I suspect he'd be delighted. He always was too nice for his own good," Kakashi answered dryly.

_'Uh, is he going to say anything?_' Kakashi thought nervously.

_'I really hope Gai didn't just ruin the progress I've made with him.'_

_'This silence is really stretching on...'_

"I agree."

Kakashi stared at him in shock. "You what?"

"On the condition that you then teach me the Uchiha clan style, I, Uchiha Sasuke, as the last remaining Uchiha authorise you, Hatake Kakashi, to learn and use this style. I will provide you with the relevant information," Sasuke clarified.

"He agreed... with _you_. Of all people..." Kakashi looked at his youthful rival with an uncomprehending expression on his face.

"Well done, Kakashi, Sasuke-san! Truly this heralds a future filled with opportunities and the majestic heartwarming love between a student and his teacher!" Gai cheered.

_'Not likely,'_ thought Sasuke. The only thing Kakashi majestically heartwarmingly loved was porn.

"Then Sasuke-san, I think continuing to use your clans' signature style will suit you most well. Now that we've settled that, I'll go over the mistakes in your current iteration of the Uchiha style and you can fix them."

* * *

Finally it was Narutos' turn. Naruto looked eagerly at the two men, waiting for praise. Though she hadn't hit Lee once (She totally would have if she could use her ninjutsu; in fact she had already thought of a strategy!) she had a feeling she was going to be complimented on her stellar performance.

"Naruto," Kakashi started.

"Yeah?" Naruto leaned forwards excitedly.

"Stop calling your attacks. It gives away your position and telegraphs your moves - besides which 'Naruto kick!' and 'Naruto punch!' and 'Naruto slap!' are not real Taijutsu techniques," he advised.

Naruto pouted. "Pedo-sensei! That was part of my awesome strategy!"

"Giving yourself away is a strategy?"

"It only works in a drawn out fight," Naruto mumbled. "I was going to fight Lee for a long time being all obvious and getting my butt kicked and then I was going to slowly start calling out moves I wasn't actually going to do and alternate them with moves I was going to do. Then I was going to confuse him and win the match!"

"Lee would not be tricked by such a thing. He would be watching your limbs the whole time - though a good strategy, Naruto-kun, it would have failed to defeat him," Gai pointed out.

"I wasn't trying to defeat him! I was just trying to land a hit on him!" Naruto protested.

Gai and Kakashi exchanged looks. "How about you let her continue her fight with Lee after you've finished your duties for the day?" Kakashi asked.

"I'll ask Lee. I am sure he shall be most taken with the idea. And, Naruto-kun if you do manage to land a hit on him, tell me. I will give you a nice reward for your achievements," Gais' teeth gleamed.

"Yes, I will also give you something," Kakashi chimed in. _He_ was her jounin-sensei! _He_ was meant to be the one giving her rewards! Not Gai!

"Wow, awesome!" Naruto enthusiastically hugged both of them.

"So then, your Taijutsu abilities. I think you have a clear talent at Taijutsu and a bit of a competitive streak, if I saw correctly," Gai started.

"Oh, it's way more than a streak. Her and Sasuke both," Kakashi muttered.

"There are some mistakes in your Taijutsu, but overall you have a sound understanding of the academy style. While Sakura is best suited to 'force' type Taijutsu, and Sasuke is suited to 'speed', your Taijutsu type is a bit more mixed with an emphasis on flexibility and agility." Gai explained. "Now, Naruto-kun, a question. Do you know why the academy style is so basic?"

"Because academy students are more dumb so they need a more dumb style so they can understand it?" Naruto asked.

_'Oy miss 'more dumb', aren't you the dumbest then if you haven't even mastered it?'_ Kakashi thought wryly.

"No. Apart from clans with their own Taijutsu style, the academy teaches this style to students for one simple reason. Because it is so basic, it is a good foundation for the students to incorporate elements of skills they pick up into it, making each Taijutsu user unique in small ways from the other. It is a style meant to grow as you grow, to flourish as you flourish."

"Okay that sounds more awesome." Naruto was now paying much more attention.

"Yes, it is a good teaching strategy. However the academy style is very rigid and unyielding. It does not at all suit your Taijutsu-type, Naruto-kun," Gai concluded.

"What? No fair! Why can't I learn Taijutsu?!" Naruto protested.

"What Gai is saying, Naruto, is that instead of expanding on your academy style you should start over with a different style that complements your natural strengths," Kakashi explained.

"Indeed. Most shinobi tend to forget that without holding a kunai or shuriken in their hands, they still have one important weapon left, their own bodies. For you, with your natural agility and flexibility using the academy style is a waste! Though you are strong, when you have been given such an adaptable body you should also be using a more adaptable style. One that focuses on using the whole body as a weapon, elbows, back, everything. A style that is free and elastic," Gai explained.

"What kind of style is that?" Naruto asked.

"You will have to decide that for yourself, Naruto-kun. I will give Kakashi some details on different Taijutsu styles that may suit you. You are well suited to Taijutsu so I believe once you have chosen a style and Kakashi has retrieved for you the relevant documentation, you can effectively teach yourself. Though of course, Kakashi and I shall still be available should you ever need help,"

"Okay. Yes. Awesome! I'm going to be all elasticy! Like a rubber band! Rubber band Naruto! Rubber band Taijutsu!" Naruto cheered.  
_  
'Rubber band Taijutsu? She wants to fling rubber bands at people? Hmmm, Ninjas shouldn't plagiarize moves from Shonen Jump...'_ But Kakashi decided not to say anything. After all how could he miss Naruto flinging a rubber band into some morons' eye and winning a Taijutsu match?! Because of course she would do it. She would do even stupider things than that if it meant winning.

* * *

Now that they'd finished training, they were all going out together to grab lunch. Kakashi and Gai declined, saying that they should let the young ones enjoy themselves without adults or some rubbish. Sakura hadn't believed a word they'd said. They were obviously just trying to get the two teams to become friends. She'd overrode Naruto's decision to go to Ichirakus, opting instead to get some food at Yakiniku Barbeque. If Kakashi-sensei and Gai-sensei wanted them all to be friends, the least she could do was take them to a place everyone would enjoy.

"Can I get a bowl of tomatoes, a bowl of sundried tomatoes, a bowl of onions and a bowl of rice as well?" Sasuke requested. "And a bottle of tomato sauce."

The waiter gave him an odd look but walked off to get the requested items anyway.

Well almost everyone would enjoy anyway. Sasuke-kun seemed to be more interested in tomatoes than the restaurants barbecued claim to fame.

"Hey Sakura-chan," Tenten whispered conspiratorially.

'_Sakura-chan_'? Well that Tenten girl sure was friendly. "Yeah?" Sakura asked.

"Check him out," Tenten said, pointing to their waiter serving some new guests. He had plaited hair - unusual for men in Konoha - and he was very good looking. Probably sensing their gazes on him, the waiter turned around and met their gaze.

Sakura quickly looked away, flushing scarlet. _'Ah, no, I can't look at another man! That's cheating on Sasuke-kun!'_ she reprimanded herself.

"He's a bit old for us, isn't he?" Sakura meekly asked out loud.

Tenten gave her a shocked look. "That's no reason not to admire the view!" she exclaimed. "Even more reason, actually," she grinned.

"Eh! Tenten-chan, Sakura-chan, you like that guy?" Naruto asked.

"No, in my heart there is only room for-" Sakura started.

"Hell yes!" Tenten declared.

"Okay, hmm... long hair, huh? That's interesting..." Naruto trailed off. "Okay, wait here!" Naruto jumped off her seat and bounded over to the waiter and animatedly engaged him in a conversation.

"Oh god," Sakura groaned.

"I know right. This is gonna be great!" Tenten cheered. "Naru-kun is like the best wingman ever!"

Sakura stared at her in shock. She'd suspected it before but... _'Naruto? Wingman? Okay, she might give surprisingly good dating advice but come on…'  
_  
"Uh, do you think they realise we can hear everything they're saying?" Sasuke asked Neji uncomfortably.

"Of course they know. Women. Ignore them, they're just trying to mess with our heads," Neji advised him. Sasuke gratefully accepted the advice with a nod.

Lee was too busy eavesdropping on the girls' conversation to hear their brief exchange. _'Does Sakura-san like boys with long hair?'_ he wondered.

A short while later Naruto returned. "Okay he's 17, single, he likes blondes, doesn't like makeup on girls, listens to classical music and his dream is to get married. He likes loud, energetic, rambunctious women and he prefers them slightly older." she reported. "And he has a thing for long hair, especially in pigtails with butterfly bows."

Sakura stared at her in shock. "How did you find all that out?" she asked incredulously.

"I told him I had a hot older sister who might be interested in him. Duh."

Tenten gave Sakura a look. "Seeeeeee! Best. Wingman. Ever."

Naruto grinned back at them and gave them a thumbs up. "You owe me a bowl of ramen, Tenten-chan."

Then the food finally arrived. Tenten openly ogled the waiter and Naruto gave him a cheery wave which he was happy to return. Sakura blushed and looked away from him, feeling a little bit awkward. She noticed that all three boys were staring fixedly at the food so she did that too. _'This is sooo awkward,'_ she complained to herself.

_'__Maybe we should check him out too?'_Inner Sakura suggested.

_'Don't you start. He is _5_ years older - that's just creepy!'_ Sakura admonished her. _'Jeez, I need to do something about this awkwardness- the boys are barely talking!' _"So, it seems like Naru Naru-chan already knows you guys somehow. Mind filling us in?" she asked. Naruto gave her a look but before Sakura could decipher it, it was gone. _'Am I imagining things?'_ she wondered.

'_I was hoping we could get through the day without her saying that in front of them. Now they'll never shut up about it!'_ Naruto groaned.

Tenten guffawed. "Naru Naru-chan?!"

"What a great name. Then from now on, Naruto-kun, I shall call you by-" Lee started.

"Please don't," Naruto interrupted.

Neji glared at his easily distracted teammates. "Uzumaki is close friends with my cousin, Hinata-sama. She met me through Hinata-sama at the Hyuuga compound, managed to become infatuated with me and started following me and asking for dates. Tenten, Lee and Gai-sensei are all used to the sight of her by now and they have long since been acquainted with her," He explained.

"Isn't it romantic?" Tenten squealed. "They make the cutest couple!"

"Hear that, Neji? We're goddamn adorable!" Naruto exclaimed.

"Uh..." _'But he doesn't seem to be interested in her at all...'_ thought Sakura. "Neji-san, you don't seem to be interested in Naru Naru-chan, so why do you let her follow you around and ask you on dates?" she asked.

At this Lee and Tenten looked at each other and started to laugh.

"It is... my fate," Neji replied, glaring at his teammates.

_'Huh?'_ Sakura didn't think that really explained anything at all.

"Don't put it that way, Sakura-chan! Neji likes me way more than he used to! In the beginning he completely ignored me, and now he doesn't ignore me at all!" Naruto declared.

"It's true," Tenten supplied.

"Maybe he does like her," Lee grinned.

"He even lets her hug him now," Tenten chirped.

"He eats her bentos now too," Lee grinned wider.

"He even gave her a birthday present last year," Tenten smirked.

"Maybe he'll marry her!" Lee suggested.

"You two - shut up! Don't talk about stupid things!" Neji hissed, flushing a slight pink. Lee and Tenten immediately started sniggering like schoolchildren.

"Look, Naruto, he's blushing!" Tenten crowed.

Naruto hastily got up from her seat. "Ah, right. I'm going to go wash my hands. Have to... to eat," she hastily walked away. Her face was bright red.

Tenten looked at Lee in shock. "Was Naru-kun just blushing? But she hangs off Neji all the time! Why the hell would she be blushing?!" She asked him incredulously.

Neji had had enough. "Eat your food before it gets cold. And don't try saying anything else stupid, or else," he threatened darkly.

Tenten and Lee exchanged nervous looks and immediately started shoveling down food.

_'The atmosphere just got even more awkward! Sasuke-kun hasn't said anything at all yet!'_ Sakura was starting to feel slightly panicked.

_'At least... It can't possibly get any worse,_' she comforted herself.

Then Ino walked in.

_'I think it's about to get worse.'_

"Hey forehead-girl! What's with the -" Ino cut off, gaping at her.

"What? We're in the middle of a meal here," Sakura grumbled irritably.

"Your hair! Your..." Ino stared at her.

Oh right. The forehead protector. Her promise to Ino. Sakura dragged Ino away from the table so they could have a little privacy. "Not now. We talk later," Sakura told her.

"But you haven't even fought me!" Ino protested.

"I've stopped chasing your back, Ino. I..." Sakura found she couldn't say the words. Not yet. "Anyway we're eating lunch right now. Come back later."

"In what, a week? How do I know you're not just trying to get rid of me so you can keep Sasuke-kun all to yourself?" Ino smirked.

"You're no competition to me at all, Ino," Sakura smirked. "I like Sasuke kun way more than you ever will."

"So..."

"So... Wanna eat lunch with us?" Sakura asked.

"Why, forehead-girl! I thought you'd _never_ ask!" Ino grinned.

"I've already taken the seat next to Sasuke-kun, though," Sakura grinned back.

They walked back to Sakura's booth and Ino slid in next to Tenten. Tenten gestured towards a hot waiter with a plait and Ino grinned at her. Bun girl had good taste.

Sasuke took his roast meat, tomatoes, sundried tomatoes, sliced up onions which he had just roasted and tomato sauce and mixed it into his bowl of rice. His appreciation for the odd meal was apparent from the speed he was wolfing down the concoction.

"Sasuke-kun, you like tomatoes?" Ino asked in surprise.

"That's a pretty shallow love if you don't even know his favourite food, Ino!" Sakura huffed.

Sasuke gave her a sceptical look. He distinctly remembered Sakura looking confused back on the roof when he said he liked tomatoes.

Sakura smiled sheepishly at him. _'Sorry,' _she mouthed.

Whatever. Sasuke didn't really care so he went back to his bowl of food.

Then Naruto came back and slid in the booth next to Neji. "How's the food?" She asked brightly.

Neji gestured to the grill directly in front of her. "Try some for yourself, Uzumaki. You were taking a while so I put the meat on for you. It should be just about done."

Naruto beamed at him. "Wow, you're so thoughtful, Neji! Sasuke could learn a thing or two from you!"

Sasuke glared at her. He had great stores of thoughtfulness and consideration! Much more than the wishy washy ponytail guy, he was sure.

"I was just trying to save time," Neji replied.

Ino looked back and forth between the both of them. "Naru-chan? You guys are a couple now? Wow, what potion did you use?"

"Seriously," she leaned in and whispered, "what potion? I could do with a little help winning over Sasuke-kun, y'know?"

"We're not dating," Neji stonily informed her.

"Not yeeet, anyway," Naruto said with a sheepish smile.

"So then that means... when you kissed Sasuke-kun, you weren't cheating on Neji-kun!" she realised.

Naruto and Sasuke stared at her aghast.

_'She just made things even more awkward!'_ groaned Sakura. _'Why did she have to bring that up?'  
_  
"Wait, you're unfaithful?" Neji asked. "For Sasuke? I did not see that coming!" He said, eyes wide. He immediately started revising his fate diagram in his head. So it wasn't his fate to be stalked by Naruto forever then. It was his fate to be stalked by her for 6 years until she switched to Sasuke!

"That wasn't a kiss, that was an accident! If you don't have any feelings it doesn't count as a kiss!" Naruto protested.

"Yet it counted when I kissed that fish, apparently," Sasuke couldn't resist adding.

"You kissed a fish?!" Ino screeched.

"Sasuke, whose side are you on?" Naruto shouted.

_'Oh no... Why did he bring up the fish? This is just getting worse and worse!_' Sakura was feeling seriously frazzled.

"So then, are you faithful or not? I'm getting a little confused," Neji admitted.

"100% faithful! 100%!" Naruto instantly replied.

_'So then it is my fate to be pursued by her! Good, I don't have to make any adjustments to my fate mindmap!'_ Neji realised.

"Why won't you tell me about the fish, Sasuke-kun?! A fish is not even human! That's gross! GROSS! Not even forehead-girl but a FISH?! You prefer a slimy gross wet thing to me?!" Ino was screaming.

* * *

"So how was the lunch?" Kakashi asked them.

All six kids steadily looked away from each other. "It was a fucking nightmare," Sakura replied flatly.

"I didn't think it was that bad," Neji said.

"What's your definition of a bad lunch then?" Sasuke asked.

"Lee drunk," Neji, Tenten and Gai all answered immediately.

"Anyway, what do you all think of each other? Are you guys getting along?" Kakashi asked.

"I like Lee, Tenten-chan and Neji but Neji especially!" said Naruto.

"Right, we already knew that, be quiet," Kakashi made a shushing motion.

"I neither like nor dislike them," Sasuke said.

"They all make me nervous for different reasons," Sakura said.

"I like them. Except for the quiet black haired guy - I don't really know anything about him," Tenten said.

"I like all of them but Sakura especially!" Lee said. Sakura edged away from him.

"I dislike all of them. Especially Naruto," Neji said, looking pointedly at his teammates. His stupid stupid teammates. Naruto, however was not to be deterred and merely smiled flirtatiously at him.

"Excellent! I'm glad you're all getting along!" Kakashi said cheerfully. They all looked at him disbelievingly.

"So Gai and I were writing out schedules for you - Sakura, Sasuke and Naruto. Sakura, you have two, one for if you choose to pursue Taijutsu. After tomorrow you should start using them. Sakura, you have training weights from Gai as well. So now, as agreed I'm going to tutor Gais' students in Genjutsu and he will accompany you on your mission. Lee, after their mission is over you can fight Naruto again."

"Yosh! Naruto-kun you still have yet to prove your flames of battle to me!"

"Definitely! Prepare to be beaten, Lee!"

"Ah, so Kakashi-sensei, what's our mission?" Sakura asked.

Kakashi started giggling and tossed her a scroll. Suspiciously Sakura unravelled it. "Tutor at the academy?" she asked dully. "Are you serious, Kakashi-sensei?!" Naruto and Sasuke immediately restrained Sakura who was trying to maul Kakashi.

"Yup," Kakashi giggled. "Bye!"

Sasuke and Naruto frogmarched Sakura away from the clearing with Gai leading the way.

"That man is such a pain in the ass!" Sakura growled.

"I'm glad you remember my 1000 years of death technique!" Kakashi yelled after them. "Most people try to suppress the memory for some reason, so this is really touching!"

* * *

**SHINOBI DICTIONARY**

**Narutos' clones: **Yes shadow-clone accelerated training will be happening very very soon. It's a Naruto fanfic after all, what do you expect? But like Sakura-chan kindly explained, Naruto will not be overextending herself and throwing off their teamwork.

**Naruto and Nejis' relationship: **No comment. Though Hinata sure is shipping it, if no-one else.

**Sakura and Lees' relationship: **No comment.

**Gai-sensei and Kakashis' relationship: **Kakashi is a douchebag.

**Gai-sensei and Lees' relationship: **YOU DON'T EVEN WANT TO KNOW. And no, no it isn't. **You sick ****s.**

**Gai-senseis' Tests: **You don't want to know. Anything to do with Gai-sensei – You don't want to know.

**The Uchiha clan style: **Specially formulated for users of the Sharingan. Another reason that Gai-sensei might want Kakashi to learn it might be so can analyse it. Ooooh sneaky! Also Kakashi - that lazy bastard - is out of shape and Gai-sensei wants to help. Friendship power!

**Calling your attacks: **A staple of Shonen-manga and anime. Handle with care.

**Team 7 Taijutsu Types: **Sakura is good with brute force – she gets in there and gets the job done. Sasuke is very fast and light on his feet – though his strength is lower than Sakuras' he can get more hits in per second. Naruto is very agile and flexible – she is good at using the environment to her advantage and manoeuvring in and out of tight spots with ease. Handle with caution. Kakashi is an assassination type – formerly speed type – all his moves are designed to incapacitate or take down an opponent. His speed potential is lower than Sasukes'.

**Rubber Band Taijutsu: **Soge -soge- soge- so-ge-kiiiin-gu! (I'm sorry. No, really, I'm not.)

Are you interested in the taijutsu types of other people? I encourage you to pay attention to the way they fight and come to your own conclusions – there is to be no spoon-feeding here!

**That Tenten: **Badass.

**That Waiter: **Taken.

**Neji giving Naruto a birthday present: **He figured it was only fair since she'd already given him a birthday present.

**That Tenten and Lee:** They're Nejis' Kakashi. Everyone needs one.

**That fish: **Ino's just jealous those weren't her lips touching Sasukes'.

**You prefer a slimy gross wet thing to me?!** Double Entendre. But it's the age of the internet so I'm sure everyone got that anyway. Barely worth mentioning.

**Ino and Sakuras' relationship: **No comment.

**That Kakashi:** Still a douchebag.

* * *

END OF CHAPTER FIVE

**C/N: Recently a pretty cool opportunity has come my way, so the next chapter might come in a little later than usual. Don't worry, I promise the maximum amount of time it'll be late by is one extra week. And I'll try to get it out before then. Till next time!**


End file.
